


We're friends, aren't we?

by Madoking



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: AU, F/M, Growing Up Together, Mutual Pining, No Cult, One day I will write something in which pausanias isnt a dick, i love these idiots, today is not that day, unable to be together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:54:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 36,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23944258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madoking/pseuds/Madoking
Summary: Kassandra and Brasidas grow up together, a stone's throw between their homes. They attend the agoge together, play in the forest together, and undertake the Spartan trials together.But as they age, they find that their relationship becomes complicated as Kassandra is pulled away from Brasidas in favour of her family's and her King's expectations.
Relationships: Alexios & Kassandra (Assassin's Creed), Brasidas/Kassandra (Assassin's Creed)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 109





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Few quick notes: Kassandra and Pausanias are barely related, just as they wouldn't have been in real life. Myrrine's cousin is Pausanias' grandfather.  
> The signing is Auslan; I am Deaf so it's what I use, and I've just put in some small ones here. They're explained throughout so don't worry if you don't sign.

**447 BCE**

“I want to hear the stories,” the girl whined, letting her chin jut into her hands to show just how frustrated she was.

Her grandmother laughed heartily, with a twinkle that only remembrance could satisfy. “You’ve heard the songs, Kassandra. What else is there?”

Kassandra huffed, blowing her short hair out of her eyes. Gorgo eyed the action with thin lips, the hair a constant point of tension. The girl had insisted on cutting her chestnut locks to her scalp on entry to the agoge, just like the boys. That she _wasn’t_ a boy had not escaped her notice: even at eight years old she was determined to be no one’s disappointment. 

“The times between? What kind of father was he?”

Her grandmother’s face lit up, eyes darting to the closed door behind which Kassandra’s mother was sequestered. Just for a time; just until she needed more than quiet and the gentle hands of experience. Kass had barely heard her squeak, let alone the screams she knew came with childbirth.

“Your grandfather was away for your uncle’s birth, rest his soul, but he was there for Myrrine’s. He wasn’t like the others. His mother had instilled a restless spirit in him: he was never satisfied unless the things he loved were settled. He wasn’t raised to be King because he had too many older brothers for that. Instead, his mother raised him to be a man among people. And he was there the night your mother was born. He was there, with me, until her cries swallowed mine.”

“He stayed?” Kassandra asked, eyes like saucers of milk. 

Gorgo nodded. “He was all I could have hoped for in a husband. He was all Sparta could have hoped for in a King.” The old woman took a ragged breath, expelling whatever lingering grief clouded her. “He saved us all.”

That was the song, of course. Kassandra knew them like she knew her own scarred knuckles or veined palms. Her grandfather had saved them all. It was a myth: he was no longer tangible even though he was real and used to walk the halls of this royal house just the same as she did. 

“Did you love him?” Kassandra asked. She drew her knees close to her face, tucking her feet under and teetering slightly with the movement. 

“Oh yes,” Gorgo replied without hesitation. “His strength was muted only by his love. And he would have loved you, my dove. He would be proud of your spearwork and how tall you’re growing.”

Her grandfather the King had loved her grandmother, his queen. Their partnership was arranged, but they’d loved each other anyway. Kassandra didn’t have many notions of love at all, except that she knew that she loved her father. 

A sharp tug of a cry came from the closed room, and Gorgo picked up her spinning and walked gingerly towards the door. She wasn’t an old woman, not as old as her husband had been when he died, but she’d lived long enough to lose a son and gain a grandchild. 

Or two. 

The cry went up again, and Gorgo opened the door, smiled to Kassandra, and gently closed it behind her. Kassandra didn’t move from her perch on the bench and strained to hear the whispered voices behind the wood. The voices could only be her mother and grandmother: all the men were at the barracks. Her father and her cousins, one a King, were toasting the safe arrival of her sibling even as her mother strained and pushed her body. If Kassandra was a boy, she would have gone with them. If Kassandra was a boy, she wouldn’t have been allowed to stay in this house. Because even though Leonidas has defied tradition and stayed with his wife during her time, Nikolaos was less inclined to resist Sparta’s ways. 

Kassandra didn’t blame him. She would have avoided her mother’s screams too, if she could have helped it. It tore at a dormant part of her: one that called to like and asked her where her tokens of Hestia lay. Kassandra felt the rough swallow retreat down her throat. Something so base and primal as this made her shit scared. It wasn’t an instinct she intended on nurturing. 

Suddenly her mother’s yells because wolfish: long and lumbering towards their break; when her breath had to enter in order to escape. Hestia would help her, Kassandra knew. And if the Goddess decided that her mother’s life was worthy of exchange for the gaining of a child, Kassandra would search Olympos for the Goddess of the Hearth herself. 

Unable to bear the sounds, Kassandra ran from the room and out into the garden, panting in the cool night air. Curls of steam erupted from her mouth, making her look like she had the fires of Hephaestus in her guts, and her hair tumbled over her face to shield it from the darkness of the night. 

She could still hear her mother screaming: still feel the pain tear her insides. But the cold made it almost bearable. Like the prickle of her skin could never be mistaken for a warm and dark room where babies are born. 

She knew that her father did this to her mother, and she would rage at him tomorrow. He must have known, too, that hugging her came to this. Kassandra only knew because her nursemaid had told her that if she ever hugged a boy, she would endure such pain that she wouldn’t be able to bear it. 

Breathing, in through her mouth and out through her nose, the pace of her heart eventually settled and her mind calmed to the point of recognising the underlying current of distress. 

What if her mother died? What if her new sibling died? 

What if they both _died_.

It was still evening, with the warmth of the day disintegrating beneath the loss of the sun, and households were awake and playing strategy or feasting or singing songs. As they would be in the barracks: celebrating another Agiad, either to sure the line, if he’s a boy, or to sell off, if she’s a girl. 

Kassandra’s mouth thinned. Her fate was woven in the finest cloth that would veil her head once the priests declared it so. Her grandmother had been married to prevent a rift in the royal family. Her mother had been married because The Wolf of Sparta gained power too quickly to not be enveloped into the fold of Royalty. 

But Kassandra? Why, she was barely related to the Agiad King. Her grandfather was his great-grandfather’s brother. Barely a cousin. Ready to claim. Even now, at eight years old, she knew that her future wasn’t hers. She shuddered. Then she sat between the rosemary bushes, face glum in her hands, and waited for her brother to be born.

* * *

“I like him so much already,” Kassandra declared, grasping at Alexios’ kicking legs. He’d gained his freedom from the blanket and was furiously avoiding getting tucked in again. “He’s fierce and his eyes are the same colour as mine and I can tell him secrets and he won’t tell a soul and I just love him.”

“Yes, I can tell,” Brasidas said, tilting his head to the side. “He’s, ahh, just a baby?”

Kassandra turned her eyes to him just as a shade crossed her face. He knew that look, and he knew better than to back away from it. 

“Yes, Brasidas, oh wise one, he is a baby. But look at him,” she said as her hand shot out in a disbelieving gesture. “He’s the _best_ baby.”

His lips quirked up in a grin. He’d never seen another baby, except his own brother. But little Drakon wasn’t like Alexios: Brasidas didn’t remember seeing him move at all after he was born. He still felt the loss deep in his gut, and his mother never recovered from it. Still, even years later, he felt the searing disappointment in her eyes that Brasidas was her only son to survive when so many had died.

But Alexios was very active, squirming along the floor and following nothing except his sister’s bright face. 

“They all toasted to him at the barracks: the men, I mean,” he said, crossing his legs. “Claimed him as Sparta’s triumph.”

“Good to know my mother screamed while my father drank,” she replied sarcastically. Brasidas thinned his mouth, confusion marring his features. 

“Oh, no. Nikolaos didn’t drink at all. He was inconsolable, actually. He wanted to go home.”

Again, Kassandra’s eyes flicked to him, but instead of unshielded aggression, she only spoke her surprise. 

“But he wouldn’t go beyond tradition,” Brasidas finished.

The lump that had risen in Kassandra’s chest dropped like a stone. No, of course her father wouldn’t go beyond tradition. He was more Spartan than the frescos in the agoge. 

Kassandra turned back to her brother and nuzzled her nose down into his bare belly, gaining a surprised breath from him and searing hot love from her. It was overwhelming: this tiny person who she would follow anywhere. 

“Are you coming back to the agoge tomorrow?” Brasidas asked. “Sophos has been asking about you.”

“Yes,” Kassandra immediately replied. “On one condition.”

“I don’t think you can name conditions, Kass. You aren’t Queen.”

A shift in her vision told Brasidas he’d misspoken in the joke. Something darting, swift footed and sure, just under her eye. She hated the reminder. 

He reflexively put out his hand to her, rubbing along her bruised knuckles. “But tell me the condition anyway,” he prompted. 

She brightened at the shift in subject to the agoge, of the place she learnt to spar and train with the other kids. Close enough to the Agiad to be comfortable, far enough away to have a normal education with the rest of the Spartan children. 

“You aren’t allowed to beat me,” she said, grip on his hand turning painful. 

He laughed so hard that he startled Alexios, who promptly burst into tears. Kassandra tended to her brother as her best friend guffawed at her expense. He was so _loud_. 

“Hush,” she chastised. “You scared him.”

Brasidas wiped a tear from his eye. “When would I ever throw a fight against you, Kass? When would I ever deign to allow your win when it takes only one of two strokes to get you bruised and battered?”

“Because I can beat everyone else, except you!”

He just laughed louder. 

Her face, grumpy before, turned angry. “Because I have a brother now who will be bigger than you one day! And he might remember how you treated me!”

Still chuckling, Brasidas reached over and stroked the back of Alexios’ tiny head. 

“And besides, you’re older. It’s only polite.”

“I still hate that we share a birthday,” Brasidas said. “No one ever cares about mine, even though it was two years before yours.”

“Well, have more friends and more people will care.”

He shook his head. “I can barely keep up with you, let alone more.”

“Eat with us tomorrow instead of getting stuck into your scrolls and you might find that you actually like company.”

“I do like company, just not anyone else’s.”

“You’re impossible.”

“I’m right.” He grinned, showing all of his shining teeth, and Kassandra rolled her eyes. Tomorrow, she would force him to sit with her and her friends and eat their lunch. And she would introduce him to them all, and he would have a place with them. 

It was only sheer luck that they’d become friends in the first place: he lived next door and their horses shared a field. One day, when she was about four, she stole two apples from the other house’ stocks, truly intending on feeding them to the horses, but Brasidas had shoved her into the dirt and demanded them back. He was older, bigger, but had not expected her to already know how a staff felt in her hands. So they’d wrestled, and she’d won, but not before her father had come between them and held them up by the scruffs of the neck. Only a few days later did they finish the fight and did Kassandra best him properly. But she’d not done it since. No one else was a challenge because of her father’s training, but Brasidas was. Annoying.

* * *

“You promised!” she bleated, cradling her elbow. She could already feel the knot, hard and full, caused by a strike from Brasidas’ staff. 

“I absolutely did not,” he reminded her, standing with his feet apart and steadying himself against the hot wind of summer. They were outside with the rest of the first wave of the agoge: children over seven but under twelve whose parents were Spartans themselves, earning their children a place in the school. Girls as well as boys learnt the techniques of combat, even if only the boys would refine it and then need it on the field. 

Though they were still the same height, she wasn’t a challenge for him. But he was ten and she was eight: he’d been doing this for two more years than her, that’s why he was better. Kassandra repeated that to herself, letting the falsehood settle into her bones. And he was bigger, wider. He wasn’t really _better_ , just more experienced. 

He quirked half his mouth at her, almost sensing where her mind was reaching. Then he tapped her staff and invited her to him again. She hesitated, still cradling her elbow. She turned her foot slightly in the dirt, letting the bruise show fully to the sun and flashing it towards her best friend. He looked at the elbow, glancing down with a crease between his brows, and then she struck, quickly reaching the back of his neck and sending his head forward. The crease between his eyes deepened as he let a small smile grace his face. 

He fell for it every time. But, even with her quick movement awarding her the first strike, he always answered. He always drove his staff underneath her arm and pried her wrist from her weapon. He always anticipated her feet lunging for him. He always knew where she would be, and where her hands would strike next. But, still, he knew that her father loved her, and that if he left too many bruises on her, his own father may receive a call. 

And besides, he didn’t like hurting her. Even if she was faster than a snake striking.

Once she fell to the ground, covered in dust and dirt, he just laughed and reached out to pull her to her feet. 

“You have to stop with the damsel routine,” he said. “I never fall for it.”

“Yes you do,” she countered. “And besides, I doubt I’d ever come up against you in a real fight. And it _definitely_ works with other boys.”

Brasidas’ eyes changed. “What do you mean?”

“Oh nothing,” she said flippantly, reaching for her water skin. “Boys are stupid. And it will work on the others, _lagas_.”

“I wish you wouldn’t call me that,” he said quickly, taking her staff from her and placing it into the rack. 

“Why?” she laughed, knowing exactly why. It was that smile that let her get away with murder. She stole, she broke things, she shirked her responsibilities, she had their tutor Sophos around her little finger, just like the rest of the children at the agoge. 

“Because other people might,” he explained quietly. 

“Oh, no, it’s okay _lagas_ , I won’t let them.”

She patted his arm and then walked away from him, towards the olive grove that bordered the training grounds. It was cool under the shade and there was already a lunch of apples, olives, bread and cheese laid out for the children to share. 

Brasidas didn’t follow her. He turned to the library instead, wanting to read the strategy that he craved. He entered the cool stone of the scroll room and breathed the dust and smell of incense deep into his throat. This was his peaceful place. A place where his mother’s disappointment and his father’s detachment couldn’t displace him. 

_Lagás lagás lagás lagás_ echoed in his ears, in the same tone that Kassandra had spoken it. In jest, in companionship. Trying to turn the name from a shameful inaction into a warm endearment. But it didn’t work. 

He’d failed to catch a single hare when he’d been sent with two of his classmates into the mountains, and they’d starved because of it. Bugs were on the menu when all of his traps failed. When they arrived back in Sparta: freezing, exhausted, starving, they were greeted with the harsh form of their Strategos. Surprised that the boys were alive, dismayed that they couldn’t survive the mountains. 

So, when the story became public knowledge, the boys were shamed for being less than useless. Less than the dirt under their feet. Brasidas couldn’t even catch a hare. 

So, now, Kassandra called him _lagás_. 

Hare hunter. 

He picked along the shelving until he came to the section on the strategos Pausanias, grandfather to the current King. Unrolling the first scroll he touched, Brasidas sat and began reading. Troop numbers, the currents of the field and how to gather them in your first and direct them to their destination, where to place hoplites based on their temperament. It was all new; insightful. 

“Oh no you don’t,” Kassandra said, storming into the library. Brasidas looked up at her stomping form sharply and pulled the scroll towards his chest protectively, thinking to save it from her. 

“I’m just reading,” he said, spluttering a little. 

“No, you are coming to make friends.”

She attempted to haul him up by his shoulder, but found her elbow still sharp from the blow it had received. Brasidas noticed and grimaced. 

“Sorry about that.”

“I’ll only forgive you if you come outside and sit with us.”

“No.”

“Then I’ll never forgive you.”

“Still no, Kass. I know you have already forgiven me. And besides,” he waved the scroll close to her nose, “I’m reading.”

She huffed, pushing the scroll away from her face with her breath. “You can read when you’re dead.”

He brightened at that. “Oh, do you think they have a library in Hades?”

She couldn’t help it. She laughed at him and how ridiculous he was. “Yes, _lagás_ , I think they have a thousand and a thousand scrolls in Hades.”

He grinned at her, waiting.

“But they’re all on fire,” she finished.

He laughed, and she relaxed at the sound. He was always so uptight, so resistant. 

“Just come outside with me. And if you don’t like it, then we can talk about…” she leant over, peeking at the scroll he still held in his hands, “...we can talk about my mother’s cousin until your head is sore with strategic possibilities.”

His mouth didn’t thin as she’d expected it to. “I won’t like it,” he confirmed. “And I’ll be grumpy. And rude.”

“No you won’t,” she countered, taking the scroll from him and pushing it back into the shelf. “You’ll be yourself.”

He followed her out to the olive grove and sat next to her. He knew the kids here already, mostly, but just by name. He’d never really spoken to them, but Kassandra was like a bright flame attracting moths. 

“Everyone,” she gestured around the eight or so kids in the circle, “Brasidas,” and she pointed back at him. 

A few of the boys smirked, and he readied himself for the ridicule that followed him. But then the smirks didn’t eventuate into a cruel word as the boys glanced to his left, to his best friend. He turned to her and found Kassandra’s honey eyes hard with challenge and deep with the promise of regret if they misplaced their tongues. 

“Brasidas,” she continued, in a tone that betrayed none of her annoyance. “This is Simon, Elpos, Anakletos, Attikos, Sophia, Khloe, and Cyrus.” Her hand flicked around the circle, pointing to each person as she went. 

“Hello,” he said. 

A murmur of hellos returned to him and he relaxed. Kass was sitting at his side like Cerberus, ready to bare her teeth. 

Conversation flowed around him, but he couldn’t quite catch the edges. He didn’t have enough shared experience, enough in common. But still, he sat, recognising that this might be a bit better than the alternative. 

“How’s your brother?” Khloe asked Kassandra, drawing her long hair into a braid. 

“He’s good! He receives his blessing tomorrow, then he’s being presented to the oracle.”

“Oh, the oracle? But I thought you weren’t close enough to the King for that,” Khloe said. 

“Well, Alexios is third after the King’s brother. So close enough to be of interest, I think.”

“I wish I had a brother,” Sophia lamented. “Someone to go to the river with.”

“Have you never been to the river?” Brasidas asked, saying the first thing that might let him into the conversation. 

Sophia laughed, letting the sound ring. “Of course I have, but it’d be different to go with a brother, I think, rather than my father. We could look for eels.”

“I could show you how to catch eels if you wanted?” Brasidas said, open and honest. 

Sophia turned to him, her eyes bright. “Really?” 

“Yes. Of course.”

“We could make a day of it!” Sophia continued, setting her eyes on everyone in the group. Kassandra nodded her enthusiasm, but some of the boys just started their smirk from earlier. 

“How can you catch eels if you can’t even catch a hare?” Anakletos said, laughing. 

Brasidas refused to rise to the bait. If Kassandra gave him anything, it was courage. 

“You’re not invited,” Kassandra said, deftly excluding him. Anakletos shut his mouth, losing his humour. 

“Oh, come on, Kassandra,” he said, shifting on the grass. 

“No. You aren’t invited.” 

Kassandra straightened, an image with the sun behind her. Loyalty made her shine, even as fury eminanted from her. Brasidas didn’t know where it came from most of the time: it was like an untapped well that sat within her. 

“And if anyone agrees with our new ex-friend, then feel free to stay away.”

Brasidas watched each of their eyes split between Kassandra, him, and Anakletos. 

None wanted to join him. None wanted to lose Kassandra. He didn’t blame them, though he’d never feared it. Once, they had a raging argument and the next day she was back at his house with an apology and a new kind of rock she’d found.

* * *

As they walked home, Kassandra rubbed her elbow and grumbled under her breath. Brasidas didn’t reply. He felt strange: like an interloper. 

“It’s okay,” Kassandra said, finally letting her arm go. “I never liked Anakletos anyway.”

“But he was your friend and now he’s not and it’s my fault and I should have just laughed with him but I didn’t and I-.”

“Brasidas…” she sighed, ruffling the back of his hair, “you worry too much.” She stopped, and turned to him seriously. “But you do know how to catch eels, don’t you?”

Brasidas nodded gingerly. He hadn’t done it for a long time, but he knew there was a knack to it.

“Good. Because I think Sophia might be upset if you disappointed her.”

“Then I’ll try not to disappoint her.”

Kassandra smiled, using the distraction to push him to the dusty ground and launch into a run, using her long legs to beat him home.

**444 BCE**

Kassandra enjoyed making bread. It was easy, always the same, and a tangible item she could present to her household as a success for the day. Three loaves: one for the family, one for the helots, and one for the vagrants that passed by their part of the world in search of work or money. They were also something she could show her mother to placate her. _See, mater: this bread proves I will be a good wife, now please let me go and spar._

The sun had just emerged over the eastern citrus trees when her loaves were out of the oven and resting on the bench. Kassandra let her breath into the air as the sun kissed her hair, making the chestnut brown glow. The earlier she was up, the more time she had to be freely herself. There was no chastisement from the corners of her eye about her posture, her swearing, her hair. She was without critique for the few golden hours of early morning. A small part of her thought it might be odd, that she would treasure such quiet when she usually sought the loud and boisterous company of her peers, but she liked it all the same. 

“Sis! Sis!” her brother yelled, searching through the house for her. 

“Out here!” she called back, putting a towel over the loaves now that they were cool enough. She put her hand into the room where she heard his voice and flicked her wrist, letting the silver of her bangle catch the light and draw his attention.

She turned to him just as he launched himself through the door and into her woolen legs, toppling her over. She lurched backwards, hitting the dirt with her back as her arms instinctively circled her two year old brother. 

“A!” she said, colouring her voice with joy and surprise. He giggled too, rolling onto her stomach and listing to the side, even as she held him fast. He was already so big and burly, his hair the same colour as hers and sticking from his head like he’d been electrified by Zeus. 

“I just finished making bread,” she told him, sitting with him in her lap. She pointed to the loaves and wagged her hand with her thumb up.

“Um!” he said, gesturing to his mouth with his forefinger and thumb pinched together. She nodded, letting her hand circle his stomach. 

“Yes, yum!” 

She used the signs with Brasidas, and with her family. She found listening difficult, like the sounds jumbled between her ears and her brain and she might as well have not heard anything at all. It wasn’t always hard, but some days it was like she was surrounded by water. It was always worse at the agoge, when lots of sounds clouded her. And Brasidas no longer sat with her; could no longer relay if she missed something. 

But Alexios was very willing to sign to her, even as he learnt to talk too. 

“What do you want to do today, duckling?” she asked. 

His face screwed together in concentration, almost worry, as he thought about what kind of day he had before him. Kass would do what he wanted: her chores were minimal this morning and he would follow her around completing them anyway. 

“Hiding!” he decided. 

“In the forest?”

“Yes!”

“Okay, we can play hide and seek in the forest, but can you help me with some chores first?”

He nodded vigorously, confirming what she already knew: that he’d follow her all day no matter what she did. 

“Thank you, A.” She pointed at her thumb, his sign name. A for Alexios, and A because it was easy for him to recognise. 

Then she took his hand and went into the dining room, ready to start the day.

* * *

“Kassandra?” her mother called. 

“In the study,” she replied, throwing an old chiton into a basket. Alexios immediately reached for it, pulling it half out until she directed a scathing look his way. 

Their mother came in, another basket in her hands. “Have you finished sorting yet?”

Kassandra shook her head. Myrrine walked towards her, gesturing to her daughter’s hands for inspection. It was becoming like this. Kass’ cracked knuckles were of growing concern, even though Kassandra barely cared for them at all.

“And how did you get these then?” Myrrine asked. 

“The agoge, mater,” Kassandra replied, like it was obvious. Like she didn’t have to resist her mother’s interjection into her education, insisting that Kassandra forgo the spar in favour of less violent pursuits. Kassandra was too good at it; showed too much promise for a girl being groomed for Queendom. 

Thank the gods for her father, honestly. Even though it was her mother’s decision, as the head of the household and the keeper of the line, her father spent considerable time convincing his wife that there was no harm. She rarely bruised or became blooded when Brasidas had sparred with her, but he’d moved on and she sparred other people now.

Traitor. 

_Nah. He hasn’t left you. He just aged out of your class._ __

_Still._

“Your tutors know better,” her mother muttered. “You shouldn’t be manhandled.”

Nothing Kassandra could say about it would matter anyway, so she just changed the subject. 

“We were going to go down to the forest once we were done here, weren’t we A?” she said. Alexios nodded strongly in agreement, smiling. 

“Good, some quiet walking might do you some good.”

Kassandra resisted replying with a laugh, keeping it bottled until she could let it into the clean, cool forest air. 

“You can go,” her mother said, smiling down at them both, her knuckles forgotten. 

Kassandra picked up a squealing Alexios, letting his hips sit on her’s, and quickly walked with him out of the house before their mother changed her mind. 

Kassandra’s life was becoming stricter, harsher. But it could be worse: she could have been abandoned like so many children were. If the worst of it was a strict mother, then she could manage that. 

“Look, A,” she said, pointing to a short tree. “See the way the bees buzz around the flowers?” He nodded his head, clapping his hands towards them. “They’re collecting sweetness to make honey. Don’t touch, though,” she reminded him, tone soft. “They’ll buzz at you and give you a fright, and we want bees to be our friends, don’t we?”

Alexios nodded again, grabbing his hand back from the creatures. They watched them for a while, each one going to a fro with their plunder on the back of their legs. Kassandra had always felt an affinity with the bee: beautiful and useful, but with a sting. She thought that if she ever had a standard, like her father’s wolf, she would be the honey bee. 

“Hide and seek?” Alexios asked, covering his face with his hands. 

“Again, please?” Kassandra replied, not catching the first word. Her right hand’s top two fingers flicked out in the sign. 

“Hide and seek?” her brother replied without pause, unassuming. It was refreshing. Most older people balked when she needed them to repeat themselves, usually missing the first word but sometimes the entire phrase. Sometimes she didn’t even ask, just silenced herself. But not Alexios. 

“Yes, hide and seek! Go and hide, and I will find you.”

He laughed and raced from her arms and further into the forest. She didn’t close her eyes, keeping an eye on him so he didn’t venture too far. She counted slowly, down from ten, before she announced herself to be seeking him. 

Then a giggle whipped through the air, directly from the undergrowth where he’d disappeared. 

“Hmmm,” she proclaimed loudly. “Where is Alexios? Is he… behind this tree?” She dramatically ventured behind a tree, shaking the branches. Further giggles erupted. “No…” Kass confirmed, making her way towards the undergrowth. “Is he… in this bush?” She rustled a bush about a metre from where Alexios was hiding, and his giggles turned into full blown laughter, a squeal that silenced the birds in alarm. 

“Is he...in the undergrowth!” she yelped, drawing the vines away from a depression in the forest floor. Alexios sat beneath her howling with laughter, trying to stifle the sound with his fists. She launched herself at him and tickled under his arms, laughing along with him. 

“Again, again!” he said, running away into the forest. She followed him with her eyes, counting. When she eventually announced herself, following him, she had to stifle her laughter at his hiding place. He’d obviously panicked to find a place. Maybe she’d counted too fast, maybe he had this plan all along. He was sitting in the middle of a clearing, the sun glaring down at him, with his cloak covering his face. He wasn’t hidden, he just couldn’t see her, and thought that that was enough. 

She went through the finding: giving him time to laugh uproariously before she snatched at his cloak and revealed him to the world. 

“Your turn,” he said, in his galloping, high pitched voice. 

She grinned and nodded, and he hid his face and began to try and count. He didn’t say numbers, just sounds like a bird chirping. 

Kassandra didn’t waste any time disappearing behind a tree, just metres away from him. She watched as his feet curled under his bottom and he began rising to his feet, his eyes no longer covered but the counting still being let to the trees. She moved herself further around the trunk, out of view. 

“What are you doing?” a voice whispered behind her. 

She refused to turn. “What does it look like, oh _prodigy_?” she said. “Hiding.”

“A?” Brasidas asked, not daring to look behind the trunk of the tree and disclose her hiding place. She didn’t reply. 

“You’re still mad at me,” he whispered, and she could feel the furrow between his eyebrows. 

“Of course I’m still mad at you. And I’ll remain mad at you.”

“But I didn’t have a choice.”

“We never do.”

“Kass…”

“You didn’t have to agree to the tertiary school, Brasidas.”

The place Brasidas had disappeared to just after his thirteenth birthday. He’d been chosen, encouraged, corralled into the highest class. The one meant for boys who turned into Strategoi and Lieutenants. It was separate; away from the plebs of the agoge. And she hated him for it. 

He was quiet for a bit while she listened for her brother’s stomping through the clearing, checking in the different places for her. 

“Your father thinks I could be a commander,” he eventually said. “It wasn’t my decision.”

She knew that he was right. She knew that his move from the home next to hers wasn’t his choice. She knew that the intensity with which he was now trained was a sign of his intelligence and his potential, rather than an affront to her. 

She never saw him anymore. He’d moved beyond their wave at the agoge and she didn’t spar with him, or sit with him during lessons, or even at lunch. And he lived in the barracks now, so didn’t walk her home. If she was honest, she was frightened that their friendship was slipping away from them. 

But it wasn’t even that. Kassandra had the blood of Kings. Kassandra was better than him at strategy, even without the training. Kassandra’s father was a Strategos. She didn’t resent Brasidas the opportunity: she just thought she should be trained beside him, rather than be embroiled in the grooming her mother had begun. 

She turned to him and looked him dead in the eye. He was a head taller than her now, the two years getting longer than they had been. His dark brown looked into her honey, and she could see the apology written all through them. No. He didn’t choose this, but it was what it was, all the same. 

“I know you’re sorry,” she whispered. “But I feel like we’re no longer friends.”

A flash of confusion ran across his face, making his eyebrows dance. “You’re my best friend, Kass?” 

“I haven’t spoken to you in a week?” she replied in the same tone. 

“And I haven’t spoken to my mother in two: it doesn’t mean anything.”

“You just run in different circles now.”

“Is this really why you’re mad at me?”

His voice was soft, disbelieving. Like he couldn’t, or wouldn’t, comprehend that their friendship was so fragile. 

She watched him closely. Each tick in his face was assuredly his. He was implacable in his opinions, disregarding any thought that didn’t come from him. Then she sighed, looking down at her feet. 

“No, I suppose not.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realise how the training would escalate when my father agreed to the pathway. Your father is atrociously strict.”

“He is?” Kassandra answered, question in her voice. “He’s the softer of my parents.”

Brasidas shook his head. “He made me run a mile, and because I didn’t beat my previous time, he made me do it again.”

“I’ll tell him to go easy on you,” she laughed. His eyes gleamed at the sound. The gleam turned into mischief in a second, and before she could blink he was taking her arm and hauling her out from behind the tree. 

“I’ve found her, Alexios!” he yelled, holding tight. She yelped, laughing as she broke the hold and turned from their racket and ran into the woods. A battle cry went up behind her, the cacophony of Brasidas and Alexios as they chased her down. She dove into the undergrowth, barrelling through the shrubs so quickly that they cut her face. She knew she was faster than Brasidas, and he would slow his pace for A anyway. 

She looked behind her, trying to gain a sense of where they were. Just as she turned, her foot caught a root and she tumbled to the ground, jarring her elbow and gasping in pain. It was always her elbow. 

“Gotcha!” Brasidas said, pinning her shoulders to the forest floor so Alexios could catch up. She watched him through betrayed eyes, her nose scrunched and her hair tumbling over her face. 

“Traitor,” she whispered through her teeth. He grinned, his own teeth grinding with the effort of keeping her down. 

“I’ll always catch you, Kass. You know that.”

Alexios toppled through the woods and fell into both of them, laughing his little head off at the game. 

“Found you!” he said, pushing his muddy palm into Kassandra’s face. She turned and grimaced at the dirt. 

“Found you!” Brasidas mimicked, bringing his own muddy hand onto the other side of her face, trailing down her cheek and into her hair. 

“You’ll pay for that!” she yelled, agitating against his pin to get to her feet. 

Brasidas mocked fright. He turned to Alexios with wide eyes but with a grin on his face. “Run Alexios! I’ll hold the terror of Sparta off for as long as I can!”

Alexios yelled, running from them up towards the city, back to their house. 

“You will pay for that,” Kassandra confirmed quietly. 

“I know,” he laughed. He let her up and they both sat on the balls of their feet; Brasidas watching for the retribution and Kassandra wondering how she could possibly get the assault past his defenses. He’d changed since they’d stopped being trained together: he was faster, more attuned to his opponent. Even though she’d very, very rarely beaten him before, it was impossible now. So the clob of mud in her hand, hidden under her cloak, with its rich texture and wet essence that she knew would match his eyes, lay waiting for him to turn his back. 

He didn’t, instead he rose and offered her his hand. She took it with her left hand, a gentle touch of their palms belying her violent intent. Once her weight was weighed on his right hand, his dominant hand, she whipped her fist out from her cloak and, ensuring her forearm travelled under his, pushed the mud up his chin and over his open mouth, forcing some inside. 

He didn’t yell. He was completely still, eyes looking at her like he was seeing her for the first time. She laughed, pushing the mud along his jaw and into his hair so he matched her. 

Then he laughed with her, filling the forest air with the sound. Spitting out the mud, he turned and began following Alexios up the hill. 

“My mother is going to murder me,” Kassandra said, keeping pace. “She told us to go for a quiet walk, not become covered in mud.”

“Somehow I think she’ll blame me,” Brasidas said. 

“Yeh, probably. But at least my father likes you.”

“I don’t know if he so much likes me as feels an affinity with me.”

Kassandra shrugged. “Either way.”

They entered the yard to find a sheepish Alexios hiding among his mother’s skirts. Myrrine wore a long peplos in a navy blue, clipped at her shoulders in gold, now with mud caked around the bottom where Alexios had grabbed for her. As Kassandra looked up from her brother and took in her mother’s hands on her hips, her wide stance, her murderous expression, she wondered whether it would have been better to risk Brasidas’ house to wash before coming here. As it stood, Myrrine wasn’t looking at Kassandra, but at the boy standing behind her. 

“I expected better of a trainee commander, Brasidas Tellidas,” she said, the force of a King’s daughter swelling in her throat. 

“Mater, it was my-.” 

Myrrine put up a hand to stop Kassandra’s protests. 

“Go home, Brasidas. Nikolaos will be told of this. Hope that it doesn’t mean the loss of your position.”

“Mater!” Kassandra yelped. “It was my fault!”

“Go home,” Myrrine repeated, the air in front of her eyes sizzling. 

Brasidas stayed silent, simply bowing and walking out of the yard towards his home. Kassandra watched him go, the silent dread of guilt stirring in her gut. 

“You go and wash,” Myrrine said, eyes now turned to her. “You have the blood of Kings, Kassandra. And you will be Queen. You aren’t a helot; you can’t run about the forest like the riff raff.”

Kassandra knew better than to argue. She knew how their mother took after their grandmother: emphasising the blood of the Agiad that ran through them. Kassandra wished they didn’t care. 

She wished she had simple blood, instead.

* * *

“My light?” Nikolaos said, sitting himself down next to his daughter as she picked grass from below the low wall. 

“Pater,” Kassandra replied. The sun was dipping behind the sacred mountain and the temperature was dipping with it. 

“So. You got under Brasidas’ guard today, he tells me.”

Kassandra grinned, still looking at the grass. “I’m still too quick for him.”

“Yes, I think that’s right. You were always fast, he just surpassed you in strength and reach.” Kassandra could hear the pride in his voice, though whether it was for her or Brasidas, she didn’t know. 

“Your mother has also forbidden you from being friends with him,” her father continued. 

She gasped, turning to her father with fear written all over her face. A silent _no_ escaped her mouth before she covered it with her hands. Terror, fear, dread, and the knowledge that it was her fault somersaulted through her. 

“But I have a way around that,” he continued, refusing to let her bask in the misery. 

“But mater has the right,” Kassandra whispered. “She runs the household.”

“She can ban him from the house, ban him from seeing you here. She can dictate your movements while you’re in her domain. But…” He turned to her more fully, gently stroking her hair and along the line of her jaw. “She doesn’t dictate the agoge. That is not her jurisdiction.”

“What?” Kassandra murmured. Not understanding, not following. 

“You were always quick, strong, with an affinity for the spear. And you’re my child and an Agiad. You have the mind of a strategos. The Kings of your lineage stand behind you. And I want you trained for it.”

“You’re…” Kassandra began.

“I’m going to train you as a commander, Kassandra.” He smiled, taking her hand in his. “No one will gainsay me; no one would dare. And if you were a boy, it would be a given. So I’m going to do it anyway.”

Her smile cracked her face in half. “Thank you, pater!” she said, falling into his arms. 

All of her fears were quashed by her father’s promise: that she wouldn’t lose her best friend; that the tightening of her mother’s expectations wouldn’t become a noose. That she would be able to expand on her talents in strategy. She would train with the boys. She would be more than a wife and a mother and a queen.

She could be _more_. 

**441 BCE**

“Stronger!” the Lieutenant bellowed, spit flying through the air. Kassandra blocked his jab, throwing it to the left but he simply crashed his spear down on her shoulder, rending pain through her limbs. She flipped her spear out of her right hand and into her left, across the back of the tutor’s neck and deflecting his next sweep. Her own advantage was coming undone: she was smaller, quicker, but against brute strength she had almost no hope. 

And everyone was watching her fail, likely whispering about how they knew she should never have been here in the first place. She refused to be less than them, refused to admit defeat. 

She feinted to the left, her spear in that hand, slightly stronger than her right. She saw the tutors eyes engage with that hand, perhaps mistaking her movements: perhaps he thought she would jab and had only changed hands to give the jab the strength to match his. But she’d never needed to match strength. All she’d needed was for men to mistake her. 

She tensed her left side, her eyes darting there until her right hand, always shieldless, always aimless, reached from behind her back and tightened on Leonidas’ spear. A broken piece, the leather new and moulded for her grip. Her grandmother had kept it for the next boy; the heir to Leonidas who would be worthy of his gifts. But instead, Kassandra had received it when she survived her first trial by wolves. 

She gripped it and brought the blade towards the Lieutenant’s neck, stopping just short of the place she knew would kill him. He paused, looking down at her like he was seeing a ghost. 

“Where did you learn that, _kore_?” he whispered, his blue eyes wrinkled and knowing. 

“From my father,” she confirmed, drawing the blade away from him. 

“And he learnt it from the old King.” He then nodded, dismissing her from the ring to the applause of her peers. She walked through the ranks with her spear in hand, sheathing her grandfather’s weapon. 

“Good work,” Brasidas said as she came to a stop next to him. “I didn’t think your father wanted you to show that particular move off yet.”

Kassandra shrugged. “Better than getting my arse handed to me.”

Brasidas laughed. “Oh how the dainty, queenly Kassandra has fallen. Your mother would be proud.”

Kass ignored him. “When is it your turn?”

“Tomorrow. I’m just going to stare them down.”

She laughed at him, punching his arm. 

“I have another trial next week,” he continued, quietly and without humour. “And I have to choose who to take with me.” 

“Have to?” she said. 

“Yes. Apparently, I have to choose younger students so I can learn to command. To make decisions that affect others. I… I don’t like it.”

“Take me,” she said immediately. 

Brasidas shook his head. “No. It’s dangerous.” 

She almost laughed at him, but then she saw the tick to his neck. He was scared. He was frightened of the task and what it presented to him. 

“ _Lagas_ , I’m not going to let you tell me no,” she declared quietly, resting her hand lightly on his forearm. It was warm from the sun, and slightly sweaty from his strain. 

“I wouldn’t be a very good commander if I deferred to you, would I Kass?” he replied. Then he sighed, and covered her hand with his own. “I’ll choose you, but you have to listen to me, yes?”

“Yes,” she said. “Of course.”

He laughed at that, dropping his hand from hers. “You’re a liar.”

She grinned, turning to watch the next spar. There were only four of them in this stream of the agoge: students with potential. She knew it was nepotism that brought her here, but she couldn’t find it in herself to begrudge it. 

Ariston was the next to spar: his thin frame obscuring how quick he could be. She was quicker, but he was a close second. Then after would come Diodoros, the eldest of them at sixteen. Kassandra was the youngest at thirteen, and the only one that still slept at home. Even though she thought that her moving into the barracks at twelve would have been a stretch. 

“Who else will you choose?” she asked, watching Ariston use his shield as a ram. 

“I thought maybe Simon or Archelaos? I have to take three.”

She thought for a moment. They were capable enough, and they would listen to Brasidas, but they might not anticipate his capability because of the whole hare incident. 

But that’s why he had her, too. 

“Kassandra, you did well.”  
It was a rich baritone, coming from a respectful distance behind her. Brasidas stiffened and immediately turned to bow low to his waist, staying there until gestured to rise. 

“King,” he said in his perfect way. Kassandra didn’t yet turn.

“Brasidas, is it?” Pausanias said. “Tellidas’ son?”

“Yes, King.”

“Will you not spar today?”

“No, King. My turn will be tomorrow.”

“Because you would clean up that Lieutenant without gaining a scratch?” the King laughed. “I remember reaching that stage too: when you outgrow your opponents. Can Kassandra beat you?”

Brasidas glanced at her and she felt his deferral. “She’s quicker than me, King. I’m simply stronger.”

“Yes, I have a feeling this one requires a strong hand.”

Kassandra turned swiftly, pivoting on her feet. She could feel the heat emanating from her eyes as she tipped her head up to look at the King. He was imposing, if lanky. A simple red himaton graced his shoulders, making him look like everyone else and not like a King at all. His honeyed eyes were smiling at her, but she felt the creep of his awareness wash over her. 

He was here to inspect her. He was here to see if she was worth the wait until she came of age. 

She felt herself cower under his gaze, her face guarded. Smaller; not worth the trouble. 

“Would you spar me, Kassandra?”

“No, King,” she gasped automatically. 

“I guess I just enjoyed the show, anyway.”

Brasidas shifted next to her, moving closer in a seemingly natural step towards his water skin that put her behind him. The King’s eyes danced with humour at the action, seeing it for what it was. 

“I’ll see you later, Kassandra,” he said, bowing his head. “Brasidas,” he acknowledged, before turning and walking away from them. 

Kassandra began to tremble with the weight of his gaze lifted. She remembered how to breathe, how to straighten her shoulders. 

“Old creep,” Brasidas muttered. “At least you’re coming to the mountain with me.”

Kassandra just nodded, watching the man she was due to marry walk through the ranks of commanders and disappear in the throng.

* * *

“This looks like a good place to camp,” Brasidas called back as he moved into the clearing on the side of the mountain. It was picturesque, with the sun playfully dancing through the grass of the ground. The floor looked soft, easy to sleep on. Though none of them would sleep. 

“Let me have that, Kassandra,” Archelaos said, taking her canvas sheet from her. She relinquished it without thinking, and watched as he began to prepare her camp for her. 

“No, I can do it,” she said, coming up behind him. 

“I insist.” He was already pegging the sides down, almost ready to pin the upper part to the tree. 

“Kass?” Brasidas called, drawing her attention away from her grimacing expression. He was crouched at the side of the clearing, looking at the tracks that lead away from them and towards the brook. “What do these tell you?”

She touched the smallest paw print lightly and the impression crumbled away under her fingers. 

“Maybe we shouldn’t make camp here,” she said, watching his expression. “ But I think Archelaos has taken it upon himself to make camp here.” Brasidas turned behind her and saw what she meant. 

“Perhaps we could hunt the pack. If they have cubs, they will shy from conflict.”

Kassandra agreed. Brasidas needed the she-wolf’s pelt to be successful in this jaunt, and he needed to keep them alive as well. They’d caught some fish and squirrels on their way here, so food was fine, but if this was a nature trail for the wolves then they wouldn’t last the night. 

“We should go now,” she said. “Before the sun starts setting.”

Brasidas tapped her on the nose before standing and walking away. She waited for him on the rise, eyes piqued to the forest. Something was niggling at her chest, a bloom of awareness. Her father was the wolf of Sparta, and she’d killed wolves before in her own tests. But this she-wolf had killed other kids during their trials and had her own cubs to worry about. 

Something was pressing on Kassandra’s brain. Something was needing her notice. A brush of wind; a press of a finger; a whisper of a song. 

“I’m going to take Simon with me to track these. Then we’ll come back and get you so we can attack the den together.”

Kassandra shook her head. “No. We all go.”

“It’s easier this way,” he replied. When she began to argue, his eyebrows shot up in expectation. “You told me that you would listen.”

“And you called me a liar,” she said, crossing her arms. “This is a bad plan.”

“Then I’ll own it. But you stay here.”

She growled under her breath as Brasidas and Simon walked into the forest, tracking the wolves. 

“Help me with this, Kass,” Archelaos called, gesturing at the fire. 

“It’s Kassandra,” she replied, bad mood filtering through. 

Archelaos grinned at her, almost challenging. “Does Brasidas only get the privilege of a nickname?”

“Yes,” she said simply. She stoked the flames, encouraging the air through them. “He’s always called me Kass.”

“So when do I get to?”

She looked up at him, his hair blond in the sun. He was Heraclid, like her, and distantly royal, like her. But that was where the similarities ended. Archelaos had a sleek way about him that made some girls swoon, while others simply lay down in front of him. 

When she didn’t answer, his grin widened and he sat down beside her. She curled away from him and towards the fire, continuing to blow on the flames. 

“You could call me Archy, if you want,” he said. She turned to him in question. 

“Why would I?” she replied. 

“Because if you called me Archy, I might let you kiss me.”

Her mouth opened wide at his presumption. It was only when his eyes darted to it that she closed it shut, making him grin at her. He was bold and presumptuous, and she could hardly believe that he would _dare_ to talk to her like this. Like she was allowed to kiss boys. Like her mother wouldn’t rip her limb from limb for it. 

“Or does Brasidas already kiss you?” he murmured, tilting his head and bringing it close.

“No,” she replied quickly. “He’s my best friend.”

“Then you’ve never kissed anyone before?”

“No,” she repeated. She’d never even thought about it. She’d seen others kissing, others hugging, but she’d never done it herself. It was forbidden. 

“But you want to,” he whispered, only a hairwidth from her face. 

He did have very blue eyes. And a straight nose that matched the angled nature of his cheeks. And he was Heraclid: if she ever got a choice in partnership, they would have to be Heraclid. 

And he _was_ very close. 

“Yes,” she replied, suddenly decided. Other people did it: it was only her mother’s terrifying rhetoric that it would destroy her life that stopped her. But what harm was in it, really? Sophia talked about kissing and how it made your heart beat fast. Khloe told her about the first time she’d tasted someone else’s tongue. 

And he _did_ ask.

It was a light pressure at first; yielding. But then he tilted his head further and made a harder impression on her. 

It wasn’t… bad. But it wasn’t the way her friends had described it either. Archelaos moved his tongue across her lips, asking for entry. Before she could think, she let him in. 

It was different. New. A thrill coursed through Kassandra, from the top of her shoulders down to the bases of her feet. What she was doing wasn’t _allowed_ , but she liked it. Gently, nervously, she let her tongue graze Archelaos’ and she felt him shift beside her, coming closer as his hands moved to the back of her head. She felt intimidated by him, by how easily and assuredly he moved. This was entirely new for her, but it obviously wasn’t for him. An unstoppable train of thoughts rumbled through her mind. 

_What if she was a terrible kisser? What if he thought her mouth was too rough or her tongue not skilled enough? What if he decided he didn’t want to do it again?_

_What if her mother found out?_

He broke away from her then, eyes glistening. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to kiss you, Kass?”

She resisted the urge to correct him for a second time. 

He didn’t answer his own question, he just dove against her, harder this time. All encompassing; surrounding her neck with his hands and bunching up her hair. 

“Not to interrupt…”

Kassandra launched herself from Archelaos so quickly that she threw dirt into the fire. It sputtered to a stop, instantly chilling the clearing. 

Simon continued. “But we couldn’t locate the wolf pack. We’re going to try again tomorrow.”

Kassandra barely heard him. The terror of being caught struck through to her gut, right down to where her dread lay. Brasidas was standing next to Simon with a look of resignation on his face. Like he needed to chastise the children. 

“Did you set up camp?” Brasidas asked angrily with his hands on his hips. He cut an imposing figure as the sun set behind him, but Kassandra thought his tone was unwarranted. She feared her mother, feared the King, but she didn’t fear Brasidas in the same way. He would never speak of this to anyone. 

“Yes,” Kassandra lied, gesturing to the half put-up tent and the empty fire pit. 

She felt his face change to something else, and knew that he was in the guise of a commander now. He’d done it before during their training: forced his new role on her. 

“I apologise, commander,” she said without any strain in her voice. “I will rectify it.”

Then she stood and did just that. Archelaos moved to help her but Brasidas growled at him to prepare the meat they’d caught for dinner. 

“I didn’t bring you so you could enjoy yourself,” Brasidas said roughly as she held the canvas in place so he could hammer the nail. 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to happen.”

His face grew dark. Kassandra sighed. “He didn’t force me, _lagas_ , if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“You don’t get it, Kass,” Brasidas continued in a low voice. “Archelaos is a bloody fool.”

“Are you saying I could do better?” Kassandra laughed. 

Brasidas grimaced. “I’m saying that he will definitely take the tale to the barracks where your cousin might hear it.”

Kassandra blanched, dropping the canvas. She refused to talk about it mostly, refused to give the dread in her chest the wind it needed to live. 

“Maybe I want to be impure,” she whispered, shaking. “Maybe I don’t want to be an option for him.”

Brasidas reached for her hand and squeezed it. “I don’t think you should test the King. One of the reasons your father nominated you for the commander stream was so he couldn’t touch you yet.”

She nodded. She knew that. She was currently owned by the agoge, by her tutors. She couldn’t be married until she graduated at twenty, just like the men. It protected her. 

He began drawing circles near her knuckles, touching the calloused skin where wounds had fallen. It sent a stream of light through her, all the way to her chest. She thought, maybe, kissing Brasidas would feel different to kissing Archelaos. Warmer, somehow. 

“Why did you kiss him, Kass?” he whispered, so low she almost missed it. 

She looked into his dark brown eyes, the ones that had been her comfort ever since she could remember. She could lie to him, tell him that she wanted to, even though it was simply convenient. Or she could tell him the truth: that she’d kissed Archelaos because she couldn’t kiss him.

Instead, she just shrugged. 

“Please watch near those tracks on the rise,” he whispered. “I have a hunch.”

She nodded. He spoke as she turned away, his voice small and light. 

“Kass, I’ll do all I can to prevent you becoming the King’s wife. If that’s what you want. I swear it.”

“I want…” she replied quietly. 

Freedom? Choice? To not be groomed into a role expected of her?

“It’s okay,” he continued. His hand moved towards her, but he must have thought better of it because he pulled it back. “Just know that I will be by your side.”

“Thank you, Brasidas.”

Then she turned and made her way to the rise to watch for the wolves.

* * *

She watched the sun go down through the trees, feeling the chill down to her bones. Only Brasidas was allowed a cloak: the red denoting his status among them. The others simply had the linen of their chitons and the leather of their juvenile armour to protect them. Kassandra leant on her spear, feeling the silken wood beneath her hands. It was made for her in a half size by her father. If it ever broke, she’d cry rivers of tears. 

She glanced behind her at the camp. Simon was diligently turning the meat on the spit as Archelaos fed the fire while Brasidas watched her. She threw him a scrunched nose and poked her tongue out at him, making him grin. He replied by poking his nose with his thumb and wiggling his fingers, making her laugh. Then his face changed a little, and he pointed at her before bringing both fists close to his chest and shaking them. 

_Are you cold?_

She thinned her mouth, knowing that if she signed yes, he would give her his cloak when she didn’t deserve it. 

_No,_ she signed instead, her head following her fist. 

Brasidas grinned and brought his pointer finger across his mouth. 

_Liar._

She turned from him then, still grinning. 

Then she heard the growl.

“Brasidas!” she yelped as the wolf pounced on her, its teeth bared and menacing. The leather of her bracer was torn in a vice-like grip as pain shot up her arm and over her shoulder. Deftly, quickly, and purely on instinct, she punched the throat of the wolf, causing it to loosen its grip. The pain eased as blood coated her right hand and fell into the dirt. Pushed onto her back, she rolled to her side to maximise the use of her uninjured arm. It snapped at her again, a canine reaching the skin of her jaw and wrenching a scream from her. A sudden stream of blood poured down onto her face, scalding and forcing her eyes closed as the blunt weight of the wolf sagged and pinned her to the ground. Gasping, almost begging for breath, she felt the beast pushed off of her and arms reaching under her shoulders to pull her upright. 

The hands were unfamiliar and she pushed them away, her sight still blinded by the wolf’s blood. 

“Kass, are you hurt?” Archelaos asked, refusing to let her go. 

“No,” she answered automatically as someone passed her a linen rag for her face. She opened her eyes to Archelaos searching her face and injury, worry written over his features. “I’m fine but…”

She looked to the wolf, dead on the ground with Brasidas’ spear sticking out of its throat. 

“...that’s a juvenile, which means it’s a trap.”

Brasidas shook his head. “They can’t set traps, Kass.” 

Simon’s yell erupted behind them as a loud, intense growl pushed through the camp. It was full dark now, like the wolves had waited; like they knew their best chance was to attack at night. 

Brasidas reacted so quickly that the wolf was on his spear before Simon hit the ground, and Kassandra immediately unsheathed her grandfather’s spear and changed her stance to defensive. Her arm hurt, _a lot_ , but they needed to form a circle if they were going to be able to take on the wolves. She eyed Simon as they tightened towards each other with their weapons outwards, but it seemed that his scream was more fright than injury. And the second wolf was also young, and not the she-wolf. 

Archelaos took his place on her left, her uninjured side, but Brasidas pushed him back to her right, letting the commander take up the position. 

“Be honest with me please,” he said roughly. “How injured are you?”

“I think my arm is broken,” she replied, losing all pretense. “But it’s my weaker arm anyway.”

“For fuck’s sake, Kass,” he said, letting his frustration to the air. 

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let my guard down.”

He scoffed, shaking his head. “Please, I need you to focus and use your strengths. We won’t survive this without you.” 

“Yes, commander.”

She spotted three in the trees, watching them. One was grey in the coat and larger than the other two. 

“There,” Kassandra whispered. 

“I see her,” Brasidas confirmed. “Archelaos?”

“Commander?” 

“Stick to Kassandra like glue.”

Kassandra rolled her eyes, knowing that Brasidas could see her shake her head at him.

“Simon?” Brasidas continued.

“Commander?”

“Can you manage the left wolf?”

“Yes.”

“Archelaos and Kass, please go for the right wolf.”

“You can’t take the she-wolf alone, Brasidas,” she said, volume increasing unacceptably.

“I’m just going to distract her until you all finish off your animals, then I’ll use your help.”

Kassandra went to argue, but the wolves made the decision for them. 

The wolves launched at them, and Kassandra leapt for her designated wolf with Archelaos by her side, driving her spear at it. She missed by a hair as it shifted right, towards her weak side and towards her blood. It snapped its jaw as her heart stopped. If it moved that way, she would be unable to stop it. She was vulnerable on her right, and she knew that Archelaos wasn’t a good enough spearman. 

She needed Brasidas there instead.

This sudden realisation made her swallow, and in the time it took for her spit to make it down her throat, the wolf lunged and grappled for her injured arm. The weight fell weirdly, like the animal was pushed out of the way at the last minute. Kassandra felt the pressure on her arm dissipate and the body of the wolf was lying on its side with her grandfather’s spear sticking from its hide. She stared at it almost as if it was a betrayal: like she didn’t deserve the instincts that pushed the spear from her hand and into the wolf. 

“Kass?” Archelaos said, surprised. “You moved so fast I barely saw you!”

She just nodded and removed her spear, turning to Brasidas and the she-wolf. 

It was stalking him as he moved through the clearing, jabbing at it. She was huge, and her fur glistened in the moonlight. There was some darkness through her coat: blood caused by injuries. But even in his competence, even in how tall he’d gotten and how broad his shoulders were becoming, he was no match for the she-wolf that had killed boy after boy sent here for her blood. 

Kassandra refused to let any of his blood be spilt tonight. 

She positioned her grandfather’s spear into her forearm and felt the weight of it. It was sure, definitive, with the blood of Sparta’s enemies to the hilt. She began to move towards the wolf, sensing its movements and where it could be weakened for Brasidas to take the final blow. 

“No, Kass!” Archelaos screamed, pulling her back from her stalk. “You’re hurt!”

She turned to where he held her arm and saw the air shimmering around it. 

“Let me go, Archelaos,” she demanded. “Now.”

“No, get behind me.”

She almost laughed, but the wolf lunged at Brasidas and she yelled instead. It tipped him to the side, forcing his spear under him. 

Defenseless, except for his shield. 

Kassandra began forward again, barely feeling the tug on her arm as she broke the hold and ran towards her best friend. As the wolf snapped at him, she felt her instincts snap in return. Unthinking, but absolutely sure, she drove Leonidas’ spear into the shoulder of the she-wolf. The animal balked, then turned and batted at Kassandra, weaponless. But, knowing she could trust him in all things, Brasidas didn’t let her down. 

He thrust his newly recovered spear into the wolf’s neck, right through its throat, ending it. Kass watched as it thrashed a little before falling to the ground, the firelight flickering over its fur. 

“Are you okay?” Kassandra croaked. 

Brasidas looked at her with shining eyes. Then he dropped his shield and stumbled over to her, pulling her into his arms and squeezing her tight. She let herself collapse, both of them covered in blood, some of it Kassandra’s, some of it Brasidas’, some of it the wolf’s. She shuddered, not letting the tears fall. He pressed his face into her hair, shushing her gently, like he hadn’t just almost been killed as well. Like he hadn’t almost joined the line of lives taken in this task. He eventually pulled away, softly stroking down her face. 

“Do you promise me that you’re okay?” he asked. 

“Just my arm,” she replied quietly. 

He nodded. “I’m sorry for it. It was my fault for distracting you.”

“I was cold, though. You were right,” she laughed, gingerly; nervously. 

His brow creased. 

“Are you cold now?” he asked gently, reaching for her arm. She looked down at it and gasped. The leather was torn almost completely through and she could see the blood still pouring out of her. He knelt down and pulled at his cloak, tearing a strip of blood-red fabric from the bottom. Then he gestured for her arm and she gave it to him, suddenly shivering. He wrapped it, leaving the leather intact until they could return to Sparta tomorrow, and tied off over the top. 

“Yes,” she replied, unable to help the chattering of her teeth. 

She couldn’t recognise the emotion on his face. He was usually mischievous, almost foolhardy, but not now. Now it was something else. 

He pulled his cloak from his shoulders and put it over her’s, tying the rope at the top. Then he pulled her towards him again, resting his chin on top of her head and rubbing her arms until her shivering stopped.

“Please sit and eat,” he said. “I’m worried about how much blood you’ve lost.”

“You almost _died_ Brasidas,” she replied, unable to keep the emotion from her voice. 

“Which is why I should be allowed to skin my kill, yes?”

He gave her a small smile, but gestured towards the fire with his head anyway. “You told me that you would listen to me, Kass.”

“Yes, I did, didn’t I.”

She didn’t argue, she just sat by the fire and cut the fish from the bone. Simon and Archelaos helped Brasidas skin the wolves while Kassandra watched the flames tear at the wood, and decided that she never wanted to do this again. 

**439 BCE**

“K!”

“Yes, A?”

“Can you bring me back honey cakes from the dinner?”

Kassandra rolled her eyes. “No, Alexios, I can’t. They’re both heavily guarded and accounted for and I am allowed a total of one honey cake.”

Her eight-year-old brother eyed her with disbelief. She grinned at his wide eyes, his open mouth. 

“Yes, I can bring you back a cake,” she laughed. 

He visibly relaxed, like his hopes and dreams were pinned on a single cake. “I wish I could come with you,” he said. 

She sat down next to him, her bangles glittering along her arms. “So do I, A. At least then I’d have someone to talk to.”

It was a formal dinner for Agiads, and Alexios was simply too young. The festival season was beginning and this was the first year Kassandra had attended. 

“You can talk to mater,” Alexios offered. 

“Yes, I suppose so.”

A knock at the door drew both of their attention, and Kassandra ruffled her brother’s hair before rising. 

“Brasidas?” she said, opening the door. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to walk you to the agora for the dinner. My father was invited.” His smile was wide and promising and the light of his pride shone from him. She couldn’t help but grin back. He wore leather armour with golden trim and a red cloak and his hair had grown long enough to show off his slight curl. 

“And…” he continued, bringing his hidden hand from behind his back. “My mother made the honey cakes, and I know how your brother covets them.”

Kassandra laughed at the scene before her: a boy with so much promise to Sparta that his father was invited to a state dinner that even an heir couldn’t attend. And that boy held a honey cake like it was a gift from the Gods. 

“Alexios!” Kassandra called. 

They listened for her brother’s heavy footsteps lumbering towards the door and Brasidas’ grin just widened. 

“Hello- a honey cake!” Alexios said, snatching it from Brasidas’ hand. 

“My name’s Brasidas, not honey cake!” he laughed, tickling Alexios under the arms. 

“Thank you, Brasidas,” Kassandra prompted, poking her brother in the back. He attempted it, but just sprayed crumbs throughout the floor and entryway. 

“We should go, Kass,” Brasidas said. She nodded, but gestured him inside so she could finish dressing. Alexios ran into the backyard and Brasidas followed her into her bedroom. 

“I don’t think I’ve been in here since your mother banned me from the house,” he said, looking around. “That’s new.” He pointed at a pot under the window that was full of flowers. “I know that’s new because of how often we used to scramble out the window.”

She sat at the dresser table and laid out her jewellery. 

“That’s pretty,” he said, coming to stand behind her. His fingers grazed the inlaid gold lightly, reverently. “Matches your eyes.”

“Yes,” she confirmed in a deadpan voice. “One must be presentable.”

“For who?”

“Who else?” 

“Have you told him that you don’t want to marry him?” Brasidas asked softly. 

“No. I barely speak to him. He just watches me from afar.”

She felt the brush of his cloak as he knelt beside her chair. 

“It might not be that bad,” he said, picking up the necklace. “Your parents like each other.” He gestured for her to turn and she obliged, dragging her hair towards her right shoulder. His fingers grazed her skin and caused goosebumps to erupt, like a trail of fire. She shivered, shaking her head slightly. 

“My parents _chose_ each other, Brasidas,” she muttered.

She turned to him and found herself only a handwidth from his face, his eyes searching hers. She relented, for once, and let her forehead rest against his as she refused to let the tears of frustration fall. 

“I told you that I would do anything to protect you from this,” he murmured.

“Brasidas…”

“And I meant it, Kass.”

She shook her head. “It asks too much of you. He’s your King, too.”

“And you’re more important to me than any of that.”

A giggle erupted from her. He was ridiculous. She knew the reverse was true: that if their positions were switched, she would have already spirited him away. 

She shook her head again. “I can’t be. This is Sparta.”

His gaze glanced downward, lingering on her mouth. 

“You are,” he whispered, before bringing her mouth to him gently. 

Kassandra had kissed boys since Archelaos: other peers that didn’t mean anything. She had gone a little further, but there was no hunger within her to pursue; to give herself over. Hunger was difficult to describe. Her hands heated and the back of her neck tingled where he had touched her, just before. But more was needed, and she knew she’d be hungry for the rest of her life.

He pressed harder at her encouragement and she slipped her tongue into his mouth. He shuddered, and she felt him pulling away, remembering where and who they were. Her eyes bored into his soul once they opened, begging him, her entire soul laid bare.

“You’re my best friend,” she said, unable to say anything else. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, looking down at his hands. “I just…”

“Please. Please don’t say sorry.”

“Let me protect you from this.”

“He’s King, Brasidas. And you would be a Strategos.”

“I would give it up-!”

“Don’t,” she said, dangerously low. “Don’t say that. I won’t let you.” Her eyes closed as she felt what needed to be said, deep into her soul. “We have to pretend that this never happened,” she whispered. 

“No.”

“Yes, _lagas_ You’re my best friend.” She squared her shoulders, eyes open and chin tall. “I don’t want to lose you.”

“You won’t, Kass,” he said, bringing her hands to his mouth to kiss her knuckles, one at a time. “You won’t. I’ll … I don’t know. I refuse to forget it, but I won’t do it again. I promise.”

He stood away from her, too tall in the room of her childhood. He put out his hand to help her rise from her seat, the hand of a friend in mourning. He didn’t tremble, he didn’t blanch: he was being who she needed him to be. “We should go.”

Standing, she resisted the urge to fall into his arms, always so strong and sure. But she couldn’t let go of his hand, almost a final touch before she would have to push her hunger down for the rest of her life. How could she watch him war plan with her husband, his fingers deft and warm, while resisting the urge to touch him? How could she turn from him, his dark brown eyes seeing her and only her, and walk the path designated her?

How could she let him go?

* * *

They didn’t speak on the walk, and when they entered the agora, a single, scathing look from Kassandra’s mother was all it took for Brasidas to scarper to his seat much further down the end of the table. Kassandra was left with her kin as they sat and wine was poured. 

She knew it was ridiculous. The whole thing was ridiculous. 

Maybe they could run away. People did it: fled the city for choras that didn’t know them. People who didn’t want war and honour to dictate their lives. If it was up to her, it would be an option: but she refused to take Brasidas from his deserved role.

“Kassandra!” her mother chastised, bringing her back from her mind. 

“Yes, mater?”

“Don’t be slack-jawed, it’s unbecoming. And sit up straight.”

“Yes, mater.” 

Kassandra allowed her back to straighten in her chair, forcing the hardwood into her shoulders. The pain was the reminder that she was behaving appropriately. 

The conversation ebbed and flowed around her, requiring few interjections from her, and usually in assent. 

“Kassandra, if you please.” The voice came from directly behind her, and the richness of it could only be one person. Kassandra stood quickly and bowed to her waist, her unbound hair tumbling over her shoulders. 

“King,” she said, eyes still trained to the ground. 

“My King,” her mother echoed beside her, also bowing. “It’s a beautiful night, is it not?”

He touched her on her shoulder, feather light, indicating that she could stand. When she did, she found his honey eyes warm and unassuming. 

“Yes, Myrrine,” he replied, eyes on Kassandra. “The sunset indicated fair weather tomorrow as well.”

“Yes, I was saying to Nikolaos that it would be the day to take a trip to the bay and collect flowers for the festival. Kassandra has declined our offer, and was instead going to lunch with your sister tomorrow.”

Kass didn’t react, as she knew not to. She had no intention of lunching with the King’s sister tomorrow, just as her parents had no intention of picking flowers tomorrow. It was a ruse, a ploy, and one that Kassandra didn’t appreciate. 

“I’m sure Lena would appreciate the company. Come and sit by me, Kassandra,” he said gesturing to the top of the table. She followed him, eyes downcast as her mother had taught her. Then he pulled out her chair and helped her sit. 

“Thank you, King.”

“Call me Philon, as my friends do.”

“Really?” Kassandra said, bemused. “Your friends call you ‘friend’? It’s like they don’t know your name.”

Her hand shot to her mouth when she realised what she’d said, her grooming overwhelming her and chanting her destruction at her audacity. She’d questioned the King! He eyed her, tracing the outline of her face as her fear leached through her skin, then he laughed. He laughed so loud that much of the table looked in their direction, with some laughing along with him.

“Yes,” he said. “I suppose it is, isn’t it? But I guess it’s simply because my regal name is annoyingly long.”

She put her hands in her lap, crossing them over and pushing her shoulders into the back of the chair. Silent until spoken to, not touching the wine. 

“What do your friends call you, Kassandra?” he asked, placing some bread on her plate. 

“Brasidas calls me Kass,” she replied. 

“Brasidas?”

“My best friend. He trains in the tertiary stream with me. Brasidas Tellidas.”

“Oh, yes. I remember now.” The King pointed down the table to Brasidas and his father, asking for confirmation. Kassandra nodded. She watched as Brasidas noticed the King’s gesture, a question shading his face. 

He told her that he would do what he could to protect her from this, from being the King’s wife. Why would he say that when it was set? Why would he say that, and then kiss her?

“A lot of promise apparently. Your father speaks highly of him.”

“Yes, my father feels an affinity with him.”

“And your mother? How does she like your best friend?”

“Truly?” Kassandra asked, risking a raised eyebrow in question. Philon nodded. “She hates him, almost with passion.”

“And why would that be, Kass?”

Kassandra swallowed, giving herself time to answer. “Because when I was eleven, we came out of the forest covered in mud, and she didn’t particularly appreciate that.”

The King laughed again, slapping his knee this time. 

“I’m almost certain that that isn’t the reason,” he said, flicking his hand. “It doesn’t matter.”

She turned back to look at Brasidas, and found him in conversation with the man on his right: one of Kassandra’s closer cousins. She felt herself relax at the sight: he wasn’t on his own as she’d worried he would be, after they couldn’t sit together. His hair caught the light and made it dance, and she watched him for far too long. 

_Why did he kiss her?_

“How old are you, Kassandra?” the King asked. 

“I turn seventeen in the Spring.”

“And you’re of-age at eighteen?”

Kassandra felt the question like a knife’s edge, sheering down. No, she wasn’t of age at eighteen: her father had bought her more time than that. Enough time to grow into young adulthood without being saddled with a queendom when she was still a teenager. 

_Why did Brasidas kiss her when he knew she had to marry someone else?_

But she felt the implication: that the man next to her, the man who had seen at least thirty-five summers, would pounce as soon as her father allowed it. 

“No, King,” she said, strong and rigid. “I come of age at twenty, so I can finish the tertiary school.”

“Ahh, yes,” Philon replied. “You’re the second woman to be admitted, by my understanding. Your grandmother was the first before she married Leonidas. And she was a strategos after that: in the war room while her husband warred. Does that sound like the path your life is wandering down?”

His words weren’t sinister, or even amiss. But they piqued her instincts and forced her gut to clench. Her grandmother was thirty years younger than her grandfather when they married. And she didn’t get a choice, either. 

“Wandering is not the word I would use,” Kassandra said eventually. 

“Steaming? Running? Meandering?” he touched her elbow to draw her eyes towards him. “Fleeing?”

She drew a quick breath and saw his eyes crinkle at the sides. It wasn’t a smile and it wasn’t acknowledgement. It was almost mirth. 

She didn’t reply. 

“You come of age in three years, Kass. Lots can change for both of us in that time. I won’t harass you, I swear it, and you can galavant and be true to yourself in that time. But if the time comes and the stars align, just know that as a King, I need a wife, and I think you would make a good one.”

She guessed that he’d intended the words to bring comfort, but they only brought guilt and fear. She nodded her head anyway, looking down at her hands. 

“And, if it makes you feel more at ease, the rumours are that your Brasidas will be a strategos, too. So you would have a friend in the war room, someone that you already know.” He leant into her ear, brushing her hair aside with his breath. “But, of course, if your Brasidas is _more_ than a mere friend, he will be easy to deal with. Men die on the field all the time, even in battles they win.”

Was he baiting her? Did he know that the air had shifted around them, each eye trained on them shimmering in the heat he elicited from her skin? Did the King acknowledge that he wasn’t her choice, and that her choice would be next to her always, but unable to be touched or held or loved?

She stayed in silence until the lyre indicated for the dancing to begin. He didn’t ask her to dance and she didn’t join in the throng, instead just watching him until the night was deep and dark. 

She felt the chair on her right move back and the weight shift as someone sat down. 

“Kass?” Brasidas whispered, eyes forward. She didn’t reply, she didn’t look at him lest her mother chastise her thoroughly. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she whispered in reply, barely moving her mouth. She wasn’t, and she knew that he could tell. 

“Kassandra,” he whispered with so much emotion that she had to swallow her own cry. He said it like it was a prayer, like enunciating her name would inflict a spell of safety over her. 

“He…”

“I know.”

“And you…”

“I know.”

“There’s nothing I can do.”

He sighed, and she watched his hand move towards her. She shied away, shaking her head minutely. He didn’t listen; didn’t even acknowledge her discouragement. His hand grazed her thigh, so lightly that it could have been an accident. She wanted him to be bold. To be as claiming as he was before he thought better of it. 

A part of her cracked a little, a broken pot unable to hold water. Their eyes moved to the King as he danced in the throng.

“He seems nice enough,” Kassandra said. 

“He’s thirty-five,” Brasidas replied, angry.

“He said he would wait until I come of age.”

“I’m almost certain that your father would be within his rights if he came for you before that.”

“And my rights?” she said, turning to him sharply for the first time. “My choice?”

He shrugged his shoulders, defeated, then he stood and grazed her shoulders lightly as he walked behind her, moving her hair to one shoulder. Then he was gone, and Kassandra watched her kin dance by herself. 

**437 BCE**

Kassandra sat with her feet tucked under her and a royal blue chiton on her back. Her hair was out and long, unbound, and her hands fiddled with her spindle. The yarn was being difficult. It didn’t want to ply and she couldn’t find it within herself to force it. 

“Let’s go to the river!” Khloe announced, deciding to break the monotony of the afternoon. Kassandra glanced between her and Sophia, both lounging with fans flapping in their faces. 

“I don’t like swimming,” she said.

“Then just put your feet in the water,” Khloe suggested. “I think I heard that the boys will be there, anyway. Simon and his friends.” 

“Brasidas?” Sophia whispered, looking at Kassandra for confirmation.

“Yes, he’s friends with Simon,” she said, slightly confused. 

“Then it’s decided,” Khloe announced, getting to her feet.

Kassandra just shrugged and followed them out of the house, leaving her spinning behind. The weather was _hot_ , without any benefit of a breeze as they trounced through the city. Each step was horrid and shade was lacking, forcing Kassandra to increase her speed. 

Once they were at the river, Khloe directed them through some meandering forest and into some obscuring undergrowth to a secluded section. She heard the whoops before she saw the splashes as the boys they were meeting jumped and sped through the water. The voices changed as the trio became visible, announcing them to the nymphs that no doubt frequented this part of the river. 

“Pleasant surprise!” Archelaos announced, grinning widely at them. Kassandra rolled her eyes at him, but smiled all the same. It was the usual group, with a few of the older boys here too: those who were Brasidas’ age. 

He wasn’t here. Kassandra tried not to focus on it. 

She set herself up on the bank with her feet gently touching the water, swirling around her ankles. She reached into the mud and drew out a lily, twirling it in her hand. 

“You won’t join us, Kass?” Archelaos said, eyes twinkling at her. She shook her head. 

“Too cold for me.”

“I could warm you up.”

“Tell me, Archy, does it work?”

“What?” he asked, surprised. 

“The way you talk. Does it work on girls?”

“It worked on you,” he reminded her, sitting down on the bank. 

“I was weak minded, though,” she laughed. “Weak willed; an easy target.”

“About to be eaten by wolves.”

“About to become one.”

He laughed at her and the sound made his throat bob. She did really like having him as a friend: he was easy to talk to and nothing fazed him. 

“Yes, to answer your question,” he said. “It usually works. Girls seem to like confidence. Boys too.” He paused to collect some mud and rub it onto his feet. “I don’t think you were weak minded at the time, though. I think you were just undecided.”

“What do you mean?” 

“I think you just hadn’t yet decided that Brasidas was-.”

“Don’t,” she interrupted, deftly raising her voice to cut him off. “Don’t finish that sentence.”

He ignored her, blue eyes piercing. “But you decided that day, I think. When he gave you his cloak.”

“I belong to the King,” she whispered, unable to move. 

“Is that set, then?” he asked quietly. 

“My father has been offered land south of the city: an estate.”

“So, no…?”

Kassandra shrugged. It was nice to talk about it in a way that was neither demanding nor pitiful. But the offer to her father was a marriage contract as sure as the sun rose in the east. Early payment for a beloved daughter.

“Can I tell you something?” he said. When she didn’t reply, he continued. “Brasidas has never said a word to any of the boys who have bragged about you, me included. He’s never presumed. Some of the time it was specifically aimed at him, to wound him because we all knew the truth, even if neither of you acknowledged it.” Archelaos paused, reaching down for more mud to push through his fingers. “And I’m sure if the King saw that, then he would let you go.”

Kassandra laughed, shrugging her shoulder. He was wrong, of course. The King knew already. If he didn’t, then he wouldn’t have threatened Brasidas with death or threatened her with losing him. The King had decided that she was his, and that was that.

_As a King, I need a wife, and I think you would make a good one._

Archelaos leant into her and kissed her on the cheek, tender and brotherly. “Come and swim.”

“No thanks,” she whispered, unravelling. Archy looked at her with deep concern, eyebrows furrowed. But then his eyes flicked behind her, and the concern dropped. 

“Brasidas,” he said, smiling. Kassandra turned and found him standing behind her, simple chiton on his shoulders. 

The tears of frustration at her path began to fall, unable to be held back by the sheer power of her will. They trailed down her face and she refused to acknowledge them; refused to give in. 

Archy squeezed her hand only once before leaving them and heading back to the water.

“I’m guessing Archelaos isn’t the reason you’re crying?” Brasidas said, kneeling in front of her. She turned from him, desperate to avoid his contact on her skin. She watched the others in the river: far enough away to ignore them, knowing better than to watch. Plausible deniability. 

“Kass…”

“No. I won’t risk you.”

“What the fuck does that mean, Kassandra? Tell me.”

Her head fell to his direction sharply, angry and simply trying her best to keep herself together in the face of his unbridled energy. He was angry too, but not resigned to this. He still felt like he could change it. 

“It means that the King has already set you before me as a temptation,” she spat. “He’s already acknowledged you as a threat.”

He rocked back onto the balls of his feet, away from her. His face wasn’t shocked.

“He’s already threatened you, hasn’t he?” Kass said quietly. 

Brasidas didn’t reply, but she saw him swallow and saw his hairline move forward as he stretched his face in stress. 

“Of course he has,” she continued. “Did he offer you land, too?”

He stayed silent. 

“Oh Gods, he did, didn’t he.”

“Yes, he did. Land in Messenia.”

“This is going to make you and my father into rich men.”

“I’m not going to take it, Kass.”

“Maybe you should. It’ll be an offer to your wife: you’ll be able to offer her stability and a house and helots and comfort and love.”

“Kassandra, the only woman I would offer those things to is you.”

“You can’t say that to me, Brasidas. We’re still young, there are many women in your future. I think Sophia likes you. She asked about you before we came here.”

“Kass…”

“And she comes from a good family, her father is a nice man. I’m sure she’s very fertile.”

“Kass!”

“And she’s fairly docile, so she wouldn’t be a problem to control, and I’m sure her management of the farm you receive from the King would be exemplar as you fight Philon’s wars.”

He lurched forward and brought his face to hers in such a sudden sweep of power that it left her breathless. His mouth was rough and claiming, with no hesitation and no doubt. She straightened her back, resisting him at first. There was no thrill, no panic at what was allowed or not, no thought as to being found. They were in full view of their friends by the river, anyway. Something inside her broke apart: whether it was her will, or her strength, she didn’t know. But Kassandra found that she no longer cared. She just wanted the feel of him. 

Her hands circled his neck hungrily, bringing him impossibly closer. Her hands were still covered in mud and she pushed them into his hair as he shuddered against her mouth. His tongue was all she could feel: the rest was simply an extension of it. He bit her lip, kissed along her jaw and up towards her hairline, hands moving up and down her back, daringly close to the skin not covered by her chiton. She dared, even if he didn’t, and she moved her hands under his clothing and along the stiff ribs that lined his torso. 

He growled at her, but pulled back as her breath became short and her heart began to forget why she was crying in the first place. 

“We can run away,” he said softly, touching her bottom lip with his thumb. 

She shook her head. 

“Then let me marry you before he can.”

Her soul stilled, even if her heart refused to stop its erratic beating. 

“I think you should take the land, Brasidas.”

The look of betrayal on his face stole her breath. His eyes widened as his forehead knotted, and his mouth went so tight that she could hear his teeth crashing together. 

“Is that what you want?”

She wanted to nod; wanted to make this easy for him. She wanted to take the burden of the choice from him so that he wouldn’t live his life not knowing: pining for her when he could be happy instead. She wouldn’t let him waste away waiting for her to be his, even though she’d been his for years and years. And the King was powerful, protecting his prize from the threat of the man she loved. 

She could do this for him. She could ease his burden. 

“Yes,” she whispered, removing her hands from his grip. “I want you to take the land.”

He was of-age, now. A hoplite for Sparta’s army, learning under the skilled command of her father. He could marry. If she wasn’t in the tertiary stream, she would have come of age this year, too. She would have been able to marry this year, too. 

A flash of a home, windows wide and sunny, a blue and white rug on the floor and bright yellow cushions lining the walls, pushed into her mind. He was there, beard long and mouth smiling, laughing, as he held a child in his hands and brought it close. The child was hers, she knew. Her’s and Brasidas’ child, made with their love. With their hopes. 

Dashed. 

The vision disappeared and the real man sat before her, eyes distant. Then he drew his pointer finger across his mouth, denying her the chance to be who he needed her to be. 

_Liar._

But she was a very good liar. 

So she straightened her back and sat tall, eye to eye with him. “I will be queen, Brasidas. And you are Spartan. You will take the land and take it as payment for your loss of me. Then you will speak to me like you would a monarch, because that is all I will be.”

She felt his eyes like the coldest part of the river, dragging her down. Her strength was only matched by his own, and his fight was just beginning when her will was already bending under the weight of the words. 

A single, scathing look stopped her in her tracks. His eyes were fierce, furious, and blindingly heartbreaking. 

“I won’t claim jealousy, because you can’t be jealous of the things you don’t hold. And you were never mine, Kassandra, despite the years that I thought you were. But if this is what you want, then I’ll take the land. I’ll take it for you.”

She couldn’t breathe for fear of screaming. 

He stood and bowed low to his waist, waiting for her assent to rise. She touched his shoulder lightly, having lost the ability to speak. 

“I love you, Kass,” he murmured when he rose. “And I’m sorry for breaking my promise.”

Then he turned and left the river, striking through the trees and leaving a path of destruction in his wake.


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "This is dangerous.”
> 
> “This is worth it, Kassandra. You’re worth your happiness.”

****

436 BCE 

_Kass, I’ll do all I can to prevent you becoming the King’s wife. I swear it._

_I will do anything to protect you from this._

_Kassandra…_

The memories scalded her, dripping down her neck like a summer rain. So sure, strong, guaranteed. And now lost. 

He’d promised her many things throughout their lives. A laugh. A song. A gentle touch. It always was a touch, even before her heart evolved without her permission. He held her hand while running through the forest so she didn’t slip in the winter storms. He brushed the grass from her shoulder when they were forced from the field behind their houses by the setting sun. He rubbed her knuckles when he’d whacked them with his spear, massaging away the pain. 

It was always a gentle touch, until it wasn’t. When she’d broken her arm on the side of the mountain, his touch wasn’t perfunctory or that of a commander worried about his charge. He didn’t need to give her his cloak and draw her into his warmth, stroking along her hair. But he rarely did touch her only when he needed to. It was almost like he craved the feeling of her skin.

She could relate. Even now, a year since she’d seen him, she craved the touch of his hands on her. She wanted to drag her fingers across his mouth, contrasting it to the rough stubble of his chin. She wanted to push her nails through his hair and tease the curls she knew lay dormant until his hair grew long, like it did when they were kids. She wanted to feel his tongue along her neck, as she had only once before. 

She’d dreamt about the river in the time since, but it was represented in an uncanny way to how she remembered it. The sun was out, yes. The river was cold, yes. Their friends were there, yes. And he’d kissed her like he thought he’d be able to do it again, yes. 

But in her dreams, he did more than kiss her. He pushed her back and filled her body with longing for him. They were alone and together, like time was muted and the agony of being apart was simply waved away. She always woke up in a cold sweat, with her hands clamped together and tears already streaming down her face. 

_Gods, she missed him._

_Gods, she loved him._

Even now, when she hadn’t seen him since the river. When he’d agreed to take the land offered by the King in a place far from Sparta, far from her. A threat eliminated. A threat that was just on the other side of Taygetos, if her information was correct. 

A day’s ride. A horse to take her and a cloak to disguise her, and she would be able to see him. Touch him. Love him like she’d never let herself love him before. The thought was a constant one.

And it was one she’d never action. She’d told him to take the land and take a wife and be happy without her. And soon, sooner than she cared to admit, the reasons for her insistence would come to fruition. Because she was nineteen, and she would come of age in the spring, a month after her birthday. 

A month after his. 

She wondered whether he’d grown his hair. She wondered whether he’d bought himself more red chitons, the ones that complimented his skin so well. She wondered what his armour looked like now that he was more than just a hoplite. 

She knew that he wasn’t married, because she’d checked the register. 

A shuddering sigh escaped her mouth. It was cold here, in the library of the agoge. Her red cloak barely warmed her, even with the hood up around her ears. Her hair was out and wild and the ends poked into her sensitive shoulders, though it was warmer than the alternative. And soon, too soon, it would be cropped short. 

“Kassandra?” a voice echoed through the library, glancing between the shelves. 

“Over here, pater,” she called back, closing the scroll.

“Ahh,” he said, walking towards her with the confidence of a strategos. But he wasn’t in his armour today, instead wearing his himaton of state. An important man, even against his own judgement. “What are you reading?”

“Umm…” she said, unrolling the scroll again. “Pausanias…”

“Kassandra, you can’t hide in here,” he murmured, crouching down beside her. “You’ve passed all of your theory tests.”

“I know, but I just wanted to know about the Persians after grandfather lost to them.”

Her father considered her through his brows, greying and bushy. They framed his face and made him look severe, but Kassandra knew the soft centre that grounded him. He’d never raised his voice to her, never fought for anything but her. But there was one thing he couldn’t control, and that was why he was seeking her in the library. 

“You know what today is,” he whispered, pushing some of her hair behind her ear. 

“Yes.”

“If you get it over with quickly, it might be easier.”

“Fast or slow doesn’t matter,” she replied. “The result will be the same.”

“Then maybe view it as a culmination of your talents and the work you’ve done since you were twelve years old. You deserve the status of Lieutenant, Kassandra.”

“The only reason you admitted me was because of him, pater.”

He tilted his head and brought his hand to her cheek. The soft stroke of his thumb forced her eyes closed. 

“Which man?” he asked quietly. “Which one do you think is the reason I admitted you?

Her eyes snapped open, clear and binding to anyone who searched them: the colour of a bee’s work; sweetness. But for all of her clarity, she couldn’t answer. 

“It wasn’t because of the King, Kassandra. When you were born, it was suggested that your breeding may bring a good match, but it wasn’t seriously suggested until you were thirteen.”

“When he watched me spar,” she whispered, looking down at her hands. 

“And you used your grandfather’s spear. That’s when he became more insistent.”

Kassandra drew a breath. It barely moved her, like the air around them was simply hanging with the dust of hundreds of years of Spartan meandering. The buildings of the agoge were some of the oldest in Sparta, other than the temple. The frescoes had watched citizens and helots both make decisions within these halls. 

“I would not have raised you how I have if I knew you would be Queen,” he said. 

“It’s almost as if my lack of suitability is why he wants me,” she replied, pushing the hood of her cloak back. She drew her hair into her hands, parting it into thirds. The braid formed without needing her thought, such was the reliability of her hands, and she drew it over her left shoulder, leaving the back of her neck bare. 

“That’s not what I meant, Kassandra,” her father said, his irritation marring his tone. “I simply would have raised you elsewhere. Or I would have curtailed your mother’s machinations.” He put up a hand to quiet her retort. “I know, I know. But I guess I’m sorry, Kassandra. I always thought that the final decision would be with me, as your father. But apparently not.”

He finished in a quiet tone, looking behind her into the sunless windows. Kassandra knew her father well. She knew that he was fierce and sure. But she also knew that although he thinned his mouth at the way Sparta dictated their lives, he still fell into line. 

“Why is it not?” she whispered, the question haunting her. 

But her father just shrugged. “He’s my King.”

She couldn’t keep her eyes on him after that. It was a convenient excuse and a hard lesson. The only person was able to offer her a way out was the same man who refused to. 

And the man who had promised to stand by her side and do whatever it took to protect her from this was in Messenia. 

_I love you, Kass. And I’m sorry for breaking my promise._

Tears began to trail her face, as they always did when she heard his voice whisper through her hair. The tickle of her emotion prevented her mind following the words to when he’d walked away from her. She should have followed him. She should have escaped with him. She should have taken his hand and pleaded with him to stay with her. 

“Have they…” She gulped only once, pushing her misery down into her soul. “Have preparations started, then?”

He gave her a small smile before patting her cheek once more. “You’ll have to ask your mother.”

Her mother. Of course.

* * *

The sun was shining, not too hot or blinding as it reached through the trees. She waited on the grass with mud speckled through her fingers, pressing them together and making patterns in the grit. Some of the sand shone a cascade of colours, from blues to golds to reds, shimmering and reminding her that this was a dream.

“Kass?” came a voice from behind her. If she waited, not breathing, then he might speak again. Sometimes she couldn’t wait, needing to feel him and his boiling warmth, but not today. Today she was as patient as the grave. 

Maybe if she saw him again, heard his voice in her waking moments, then she would be sated. She would be able to marry the King and forget how his voice woke the very soul inside her. 

“Kassandra?” he said again, and she turned.

He was soft in this light, like the sun was shining from him. Rounded edges replaced his hard planes, and she wondered, quietly, whether this was what he would look like as an old man. When he’d gained his years of laughter lines and the fitness required by a Spartan soldier had leached away. Maybe she would be able to lay into him and not feel his collarbones protrude; maybe she would be able to kiss his shoulder and be met with something other than the hard sinew of his precise strike. 

Maybe she would see him hug his grandchildren and laugh when they begged for sweets. 

He sat down in front of her and cupped her head, bringing his lips to her forehead. 

“I love you, I love you, I love you,” he whispered. 

“I’m sorry,” she replied. 

“No, Kass. Don’t be sorry.”

He kissed her then, pushing her down onto her back. Her hands trailed his arms, not quite feeling them. Like a ghost of a different plane, he wasn’t tangible when she had no memory of the touch. His kisses felt real, his words felt real, because they were the same as he’d done and said when he was here with her. But the rest was glancing only: not real. 

“ _Lagas_ ,” she whispered as his mouth travelled her. 

“I haven’t hunted a hare since,” he replied, muffled by her skin. 

“Do you dream of me like I dream of you?” she asked, running her fingers through his hair. She refused to believe that they weren’t dreaming at the same time: that he felt her hands just as she did his. That he was whispering his love to her in a dream of his own making, and the sound of his voice travelled across the mountains and into her buried heart. 

“Everyday. Every moment, all I think of is you.” He pulled away from her skin then, and she saw the depths of his dark brown eyes. His heartbreak: the same look he gave her before he walked away from her. When she’d forced him away to save his life. 

Her breathing became jagged, like the edge of a mountain cliff. 

“Send me a letter,” she whispered, bringing his face close to her. “Send me a letter with only the name I call you on it. Don’t sign it.” She kissed the tip of his nose, begging him to listen. “I have to know if you’re here too. I have to know if you’re here with me and this isn’t just my mind remembering you.”

He nodded once, then kissed her again. “And if you’re here with me,” he said roughly, unable to hold back his emotion. “Send back _meli_ , my perfect sweetness.”

She nodded, knowing it was a farce. Knowing that this was just her mind seeking him when her body could not. 

But then he did something different, something the dream had never done before. 

He pushed her hands above her, securing them in his fist, and he crumpled her chiton away from her, kissing lightly down the sides of her body. She gasped at the feeling, breath short. He continued down her neck, across her bare breasts, tickling with his mouth as he went. She found herself begging him with the tilt of her body, as she would have done to him if he was here with her. 

She needed _more_. 

“Brasidas…” she whispered as he ventured lower, to where her need coiled. 

“ _Meli_ ,” he replied. 

“I’m sorry I sent you away.”

“And I’m sorry I went.” He paused his tongue at the base of her belly and looked up at her through his brown eyebrows. “I should have thrown you onto my horse and escaped with you.”

“He would have found us.”

“And that’s why you sent me, Kass. It wasn’t because you didn’t love me. It was because you loved me too much.”

He kissed her skin, sealing the accusation with a promise. Then she watched as his tongue swirled lower and lower, stealing her breath and tightening her skin. She felt herself melting away from his touch, even as he grasped her tight and refused to let go.

“No,” he growled, low and tight into her, making stars dance before her eyes. “You’re mine, Kass.”

But the dream was ending as her body curled towards the heat where he touched her. 

“I love you,” she whispered, even as he fought to hold onto her.

Then she woke with a start, sweating and shouting, into the darkness of Sparta. Breathing hard and fast, and feeling the coil released within her, she closed her eyes and refused tears. Refused to break the feeling of warmth and surety that came with him. 

So instead she laid back down into the soft wool, and let her mind remember how his face looked. How his hands felt. How his tongue had burnt her skin wherever it lashed her. 

The songs of the birds kept her awake, and she was due to wake and bake the bread for the day. She was on the eastern side of the mountains to Brasidas: was he waking to a dawn, too? Was he really there, in her arms? Was it a dream they’d shared?

Did he forgive her for forcing him away?

It was all Kassandra thought about as she baked the bread and set it on the bench. Today would be more lessons with her mother; more ways that she could disgrace herself in front of foreigners here to respect her future husband. More ways to disgrace the Agiad name. 

But her mother’s lessons weren’t like that at all. 

“Kassandra,” Myrrine said once her daughter presented herself in the study. 

“Mater,” Kassandra replied formally, setting herself down at the loom to practice while her mother imparted lessons. She picked up the wool yarn and twirled it around the shuttle, keeping the threads clear of each other. 

“Today we’re going to discuss the succession,” her mother began. 

“Yes, mater,” she said automatically, the tone the same as it has been since she was small. 

“And I want a herringbone pattern in that warp. There are lease sticks there to assist. It’s important that it’s Herringbone.”

“Why?”

Her mother’s lips quirked up in a knowing smile, and she patted Kassandra’s hand lightly. 

“Red and white herringbone is the traditional gift from the queen to her heir. And you have to practice if the cloth is going to reach perfection by the time your son is born.”

Kassandra dropped the shuttle, her hands shaking. They were as white as the wool she was to work with, and as numb as the grave. 

She couldn’t think of it. She’d refused, point blank, to consider anything beyond the actual marriage because it was a vast canyon of indifference. But once she turned twenty, she would marry. She would marry and bear. 

And herringbone would be her connection to the dynasty she’d been born into. 

“Now, I don’t imagine that you know what’s involved in the production of children, but it’s quite simple, really. But it’s very important, Kassandra, that you are faithful to your husband, because only then will it be assured that your son is Heraclid.”

“My son would be Heraclid anyway,” Kassandra said sharply. “I’m more royal than he is.”

Her mother thinned her mouth. “You must learn his needs and wants, so he doesn’t seek...”

Kassandra ceased listening. She picked up the shuttle gingerly, feeling the smooth wood in her hands. It was inoffensive, mostly, with a quirk of knotted wood belying its perfect make. Kassandra had grown up with this shuttle: this shuttle likely wove the blankets she woke up in this morning; likely wove the material on her back as she sat in the study and looked at wood. 

But Kassandra didn’t care what the shuttle meant, nor what its history had been. She still threw it with all of her strength until it had disappeared out the window and into the horses’ field. Her breath came heavily as her mother’s shock settled over her, and she waited for the blow. It came quickly, sharply: a slap across her face for her insolence. 

The red mark smarted, and Kassandra touched her fingertips to her face gently. She refused to be cowed. Her feet found the floor, and stood to her height over her mother. 

“I will be Queen, mater, as per your demands, and you will begin treating me as such. You will never strike me again, do you understand?”

Myrrine looked at her through hooded eyes, like she’d never seen her before. 

“Understood,” she said simply, before rising and venturing outside in search of the shuttle. Kassandra looked at the red warp and drummed her fingers across it, letting its tension seep into her skin. Then she turned and left the house, walking towards the south of the city and the agoge.

* * *

“Alexios, you can do better than that,” she called, leaning on the barrier. Her brother spared her a glance and smirked, twisting his spear in his hand. 

He struck out again, a stronger, better jab than before, but his tutor still blocked it lazily. 

“Alexios!” she called again. He looked at her as she flicked her nose with her pointer finger outward, then pointed at the tutor and back at her eyes with her pointer and middle finger. Her brother smirked again and nodded, widening his stance. Then she saw his gaze shift to the left, his weaker arm, and the tutor’s eyes follow it. Then Alexios, simply by instinct, struck out with his right arm, twirling the spear in his hands and bringing it to the neck of the tutor in a strike that felt like lightning. 

Kassandra burst with pride, clapping her hands. They would make a warrior out of him yet. 

“Well done, A,” she said as he walked towards her. “That was fantastic.”

“You were right,” he replied, picking up his water skin. “He relies on his eyes, that’s how he could block me so easily.”

“Yes. But it won’t work again. You have to bluff more. Pater can teach you.”

“Kassandra?” 

She turned to find Ariston, one of her peers in the tertiary stream. He was armoured in gold with his red cloak flanking his back. “Sophos wants to see you in his office.”

Kassandra nodded, then turned to ruffle Alexios’ hair before following Ariston towards the largest building in the agoge. 

“This is it, isn’t it,” Kassandra muttered.

Ariston looked at her sadly, his blue eyes the shape of turned-down almonds. “Yes, I think so.”

“I should be happy.”

“There are many things that can make a person happy, Kassandra. But if you’re not by nature ambitious, I don’t see why this should be one of them.”

She paused in the hallway and reached for his arm, stilling him. “Have you heard from him?”

Ariston looked at her in the pitiful way she was used to. “Yes,” he said finally. He glanced up and down the corridor before continuing. “He’s in Messenia, as you know. And he’s…”

“What, Ari?”

He shook his head, refusing to speak. 

“If he’s happy, then I can handle it,” she continued, squaring her shoulders. 

He began searching her eyes, looking for something and finding it. “Then you can’t handle it, Kassandra.”

He turned then and walked her further into the labyrinth of the agoge and towards Sophos. Towards her graduation. Towards the time when her safety would be torn down.

* * *

“I believe congratulations are in order.”

“My King,” her mother bowed, while Kassandra refused to turn. 

“A Lieutenant, Kassandra. So your mind is as sharp as your teeth.”

Still, she refused to turn. 

“If you would excuse us, Myrrine,” he said in that stupid authoratative tone he used. Her mother relented straight away, leaving Kassandra alone at the edge of the forest of her childhood. Her feet were bare so she could feel the rocks beneath them; so she could remember to feel anything at all. 

“I’m very proud of you, Kass,” he said, coming to stand beside her. He leant his elbows back on the wooden fence that kept the horses to the field, and faced her. 

She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. Her eyes were trained west, to the sacred mountain, to Messenia, unseeing of anything but the immediate ground in front of her and the soul hidden so many miles away.

“It’ll be nice to have a wife that can match me in strategy,” he continued. “Better than having a doe-like damsel.”

_You have to stop with the damsel routine. I never fall for it._

“If I became a doe, would you stop hunting me?” she asked, eyes blazing. 

He laughed so loudly that it stopped the hum of the birds. “Why would I give up the hunt when you’ll be mine by the next full moon?”

She turned to him sharply. “Kings are always married in Gamelion,” she whispered, begging. Pleading. 

More time. More time. More time. 

She would barter with her very soul for _more time_.

“Not this one,” he said. “I’ve waited too long already.”

He reached over and trailed his finger across her shoulder and down the back of her arm. Shivering, she held her tongue long enough for him to become more adventurous and sneak the palm of his other hand under the back of her chiton. 

“Tell me, Philon, do you always get what you want?” she whispered. 

“Yes,” he replied as he came closer. 

“And if you’re denied?”

His lips gently touched the back of her neck, where her braid exposed the skin. A shock of revulsion spread through her as she fought with her will not to crack her head back and break his nose. 

These weren’t his places to touch. These weren’t where the King of Sparta could touch her. Only one man was allowed, and even then, only in her dreams. 

“I’m rarely denied,” he answered. “In fact, Kass, I think we can expedite at least one aspect of the marriage, especially since a moon won’t make a difference.”

She didn’t shake. She didn’t shudder. She didn’t give any physical reaction to his words. Instead, she laid her only hand bare. 

“My father would kill you for it,” she said, calmly and assuredly. 

Philon laughed into her neck, kissing down to her shoulder. 

“Oh, my dove. He would never find out.”

He pulled at her arm and spun her around to face him. He was taller by half a head, and Kassandra felt a hum of satisfaction: Brasidas was taller than him, even with their difference in years. Brasidas would stand above him. 

But he licked his lips as he held onto her tight, shaking her a little. “And you wouldn’t tell him, Kassandra. Your family has a position, a right to this life that could be stripped away should the King see it fit. Your brother is soon to enter the second wave of the agoge, and boys die on the mountain all the time. Your father is soon to be sent to guard the coast, too, and it would be a shame if something were to happen to him. And that’s beside the real reason you’re resisting me, but he could be dealt with too.”

She closed her eyes so her tears couldn’t escape. He owned her so thoroughly; he pinpointed her weaknesses so thoroughly that she could barely move for fear. 

He tilted his head. “Even now, you pine after a man who should be dead to you. I’m disappointed, Kass.”

“It’s Kassandra,” she whispered, sharp and true. “That name is not for you.”

“No,” the King replied, smiling. “It’s for him. But rest assured, my dove, you’ll never hear it from his lips again.”

He brought his mouth to hers and her body went rigid. She didn’t feel anything except the deep regret that she couldn’t fool him into relaxing. She couldn’t convince him that she was easily his, and then spirit herself away.

When he pulled away, she forced herself to look him in the eye. Her fury was trapped just beneath the surface, corralled by her desperation. 

“If you leave him alone, then I’ll come to you willingly.” 

The words were quiet, said without feeling or expectation. Said in the same way as when she’d asked Brasidas to take the land; told him that she would be queen, and he should treat her like it. 

“Stop pining for him, and I won’t kill him,” Philon replied. “Convince me.”

Kassandra swallowed, then nodded her head. She could do this. To keep him safe. To keep him whole. That’s all that mattered, in the end. 

He brought his mouth to hers again and she forced herself to melt into him, reaching up and pushing her hands around his neck. He groaned against her open mouth and lifted her up to him, arms around her waist, and sat her on top of the fence, braced against him. 

She could do this. 

She could protect him. 

He’d protected her his whole life, and deserved this from her. 

When the King began pushing her chiton up, Kassandra’s resolve began to crack. 

“King,” she said quietly as he kissed along her neck. “I’ve not done this before.”

“If you had, then I would murder the man who’d done it,” he replied, hiking her closer to him. 

_You have to stop with the damsel routine. I never fall for it._

_I doubt I’d ever come up against you in a real fight, Brasidas. And it definitely works with other boys._

“Philon,” Kassandra whispered, letting her body go limp. “This isn’t how I imagined this to be.” She closed her eyes and gulped down her revulsion. “I thought it was meant to be special.”

He stopped then, his hands paused in their wanderings. He looked at her, searching for the lie. She only deepened the mild fear in her eyes; the unknown; the quest for mercy. He relented, pulling his hands from her thighs and pushing his forehead onto hers. 

“I’m sorry, Kass. It should be special, yes, and the Gods know I’ve waited long enough, and can wait longer.” He sighed before planting a kiss onto her forehead. Then he lifted her from the fence and dropped her to her feet. She stumbled a little, but straightened against the hand he put out to steady her. 

She bowed only her head, and straightened without permission. Then she walked away from him, using all of her strength to ignore her instincts to run from a predator, and made her way into her parents’ house. 

Her father looked up at her when she walked in, and his gaze burnt through her. 

“Tell me, pater,” she said through tears. “Why is there never anything that you can do?”

His mouth thinned and he frowned, but he didn’t answer before Alexios walked into the house. 

“Pater, we’re due at the barracks for dinner. And Kassandra, this note came for you from Ariston.” He held out a roll of parchment, sealed in red. 

Her father stood and followed her brother out of the room, not glancing at her again. Kassandra cried as she walked to her bedroom, shutting the door behind her. 

The scroll took a knife to open, and she let it unravel on her lap. It might prove a distraction, she thought. Ariston used to tell her jokes to make her feel better, after all. 

Instead, it had a single scrawled name, written the black ink of state. 

_Lagas._

Lagas. Her Lagas. The man she loved. The one she’d begged to write to her, to prove that her dreams were his, too. 

Then smaller, at the bottom: almost inconsequential.

_I love you, still._

Kassandra pulled the letter to her chest, feeling the beat of her heart through the miles it had travelled. It was in Messenia, with him. If he was there, her keeping was too.

* * *

“Brasidas!” she yelped, launching at him as soon as he made it into the clearing. He tugged her into his arms, squeezing her so tightly that if this wasn’t a dream, it might be painful.. 

“I got your letter,” she whispered. 

“That’s exactly what dream Kass would say,” he laughed. 

“Ariston gave it to my brother.”

“Yes, those were his instructions.”

“And I love you too.”

“Again,” he said, putting her down. “Something dream Kass would say.”

He laughed at the grumpy look on her face. Then he stroked down her face and kissed her, silencing her dissent. 

She shuddered away from him at the contact, almost falling to the ground in the waves of guilt that rolled off her. It was too similar; uncanny, even though she wanted one and detested the other. 

He caught her by the arm, but let her go once she was steady. 

“What’s wrong, Kass?” he whispered. 

“The King kissed me tonight,” she replied, hands going to her mouth. 

Brasidas’ eyes darkened just a fraction before he let the emotion go. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to burden you with it but…”

“But you felt guilty,” he finished. She nodded, and moved back into his arms. He hesitated only a second before putting them around her again. Her safety; his promise to her. “There’s no need, Kass. I’d never fault you for it.”

“I know, I just…”

“So you’ve already married him, then?” he gulped. 

“No,” she said, drawing away from him to look into his eyes, and she wished she hadn’t. The heartbreak was horrible; unbearable. The depth of the universe was in his eyes, and even then how strong he felt this was unfathomable. “No, _lagas_.”

He kissed her lightly at first: a forgiveness. A reminder that there was almost nothing that would tear him from her. Then he kissed her harder: a claim. 

His hands moved down and he grasped her under her arse, pulling her up and towards him. She circled her arms around his neck and drew around him with her legs. It was easy: this was easy. There was no hesitation and no thought of any. He kissed her like he was permitted to: like she was his to have for the rest of their lives. 

“Brasidas…” she whispered when his kissing moved to her neck. Her chiton was riding up her thighs, and she let it. She didn’t want to ruin any time here; she didn’t want to distract him or make him sad, but she felt she needed to tell him regardless. “He’s moved the wedding to the next moon,” she said. 

He paused at the base of her neck, where her collarbones met in a depression that made her shiver. 

“Ariston is due to check in soon,” he said, voice gruff. “At my home.”

She went very still. “I have… there are rituals that need to occur on Taygetos. I camp alone over two nights to collect the flowers for the ceremony, for my veil. We could…”

“Ariston could accompany you here.”

“And if I don’t show up, then you know I’m only dream Kass.”

He laughed then, his face transformed. “No, I don’t think dream Kass would shy from me when I kiss her.” He held her tighter, still with her legs around him. “Do you think we can pull it off? With so many eyes on you?”

“Yes,” she said immediately. “The ritual is private, personal. No one would dare follow me.”

“And when you return to Sparta with no flowers?”

“Who says that I’m returning?” she whispered. 

“Don’t, Kass. Don’t do that. Don’t send me away and then tell me that you need me.”

“How could I not?” she replied, dropping her legs. “He was going to kill you. He told me that he would just tonight.” She straightened away from him, suddenly furious. “I have to simultaneously convince him that I’m over you while I break everytime I think of you. I have to hide you, because otherwise he’ll send someone after you. And I’m not strong enough sometimes, _lagas_ , sometimes I want to break and hurl things and punish him for putting me in this position. Yes, I need you. I need you like I need breath, but instead, I’m held to the word of a King!”

He opened and closed his mouth several times as he watched her yell: unspeaking.

“I can’t do it,” she said eventually. “I can’t marry him.”

He was gentle when he reached for her this time. “Then come to my home and I’ll love you how you deserve to be loved, Kass.” He tipped her face towards his and stared deeply into her eyes. “I swear it.”

She nodded, then he slipped away from her, disappearing into the ether.

* * *

“This is a bad plan, Kassandra,” Ariston said as he cleaned his spear. 

“It’s the only one I have,” she replied, chewing on an apple. They were in the courtyard outside the barracks: the only place women were allowed, and people milled around them enjoying the sunshine. 

“I should never have given you the letter,” he continued. “It would only lead to something mad like this. And you do know that Pausanias has eyes everywhere, right?”

“Yes, I’m aware.” Once she first felt them at thirteen, she’d never stopped sensing their presence.

“And how do you expect to do this? Pretend to be a hoplite and go west with me? What happens to you here? Do you simply disappear for three days?”

She shrugged. “Yeh, basically. I have to collect flowers for my wedding and have a three day window.”

“And when you come back with no flowers?”

“Alexios is going to pick them for me.”

His eyebrows disappeared into his hair. “You’d trust your eleven-year-old brother with this?”

“Of course. And you’ll send him on a trial that doesn’t really exist. He’ll travel with us, then we’ll drop him off, he’ll pick the flowers, and then we’ll pick him up on the way back. It’s the perfect plan.”

“I don’t like it, Kassandra,” he whispered, leaning in close to her. He studied her face, from the tip of her chin all the way back to her heart-shaped hairline. He eventually settled on her eyes: boring into them. “But Brasidas is miserable. I’m worried about him.”

Her heart jolted in her chest, confirmation that his sad eyes weren’t just her imagination. 

“So you’ll help me?” she whispered. 

“Yes, I’ll help you. But only because it’ll help Brasidas too.”

“Thank you, Ariston.”

* * *

Her hair was too long and uncomfortable as it sat under her cap. She just needed to wait for Ariston and Archelaos to meet her in the hills before they could continue west. Alexios was with them, his instructions clear and his mind very, very concerned. 

She chewed her lip as she waited in the cool light before dawn. This was insane. What if the dreams weren’t real, and she showed up at his house unannounced? What if the dreams were just in her mind, and she showed up at his house to him happy and settled?

What if the dreams weren’t true, and he was happy and settled and in love with someone else?

 _I love you, still_.

She held the torn note in the space made by her armour, between her breasts, feeling it crunch whenever she moved. The plate had been a spare, one that was leather and viewed as fairly useless by the powers-that-be, so Kassandra had sewn it a little tighter and taken the liberty of wearing it. It made her look like a kid still in training, but that was better than looking like a girl stuck on the mountain. 

Her horse stamped in its anticipation, a grey mare that had accompanied her since she was fifteen. 

“Hush,” she whispered, bending down to pat her neck. “Won’t be long.”

“That’s the truth!” Archelaos called as he came out of the woods. He was grinning widely, his teeth shining in the small light afforded them. 

“Good to see you, Archy,” she said, bringing her horse close to his. “Where’s Ariston and Alexios?”

“Coming up behind. We weren’t entirely sure where you’d be waiting so scouted a little north and south.”

She nodded, then stared down at her hands, unable to meet his eye. “You were right, you know,” she said. “About him.”

“I’m always right, Kass. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”

She smiled at him, appreciating him truly for the first time. “Then I suppose that I should listen to you more often.”

“That you should.”

The sounds of a horse made its way through the forest and Kassandra stiffened in her seat, making out the first sounds of her brother. Their war stallion meandered into view with Alexios riding pillion, and his face lit up at the sight of her. 

“K!” he said, waving at her. She dismounted and collected him off the horse, holding him close. 

“How was the ride, A?” she said, ruffling his hair. 

“It was fine. Ariston told me stories about the mountains as we came through.”

“Did he now?” Kassandra said, turning to the man in question. 

Ariston shrugged. “Just some of the songs,” he replied. “But we best get a move on. It’s a day’s ride.”

Kassandra turned to her brother and rubbed up and down his arms. “A, I need you to remember what we’ve told you, okay? You need to collect the flowers, but keep them here until we return for you in two days. This valley was cleared of wolves last week, so you shouldn’t have any trouble, but please camp in the trees just in case.”

“Yes, Kassandra,” he said, straightening his shoulders. “I can do it.”

“Thank you, A. This means the world to me.”

She took one last look at him, then mounted her horse and led the two men into the forest and up over the mountains. They spoke amongst themselves, but Kassandra found that she couldn’t join in. She couldn’t prevent the sick ache that had started in her gut and was growing as each minute passed. She found herself desperate to ask; desperate to confirm for herself before she laid herself bare. 

“Ariston?”

“Kassandra?”

“Do you swear he would want to see me?”

Ariston chuckled, looking down at the ground. “Kassandra, I swear that he hasn’t lived since he left here. Archelaos will confirm it.”

“It’s true, Kass. He’s been… well, sick.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, reining her horse in. 

“You’ll know what I mean when you see him. But he barely eats, and he barely leaves the house except for musters.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?” she whispered, breath caught. 

Ariston shrugged. “We thought you’d rejected him for the King.”

She turned from them then, unable to face them. She had. She had turned him away. She had told him to take the land and forget her. To treat her like the queen she was intending to be. To protect him from her soon-to-be husband’s baser instincts. 

But, instead, she’d endangered him by travelling to Messenia. By requesting the note from him. She’d also endangered her friends and her brother in order for this to happen. 

Maybe it was selfish. Maybe it was unkind. Maybe it would prolong his suffering, because she would have to return to Sparta anyway. 

Unable to control herself, she urged her mare onward, vowing to deal with the consequences when they arose. 

And if he was as sick as they had made it sound, then she needed to be with him, too.

* * *

She could tell when they’d reached his estate. The ground was newly tilled, ready for the spring planting, and the helots called companionably to each other over the shouts of children running through the yard. The fields lay before them like a checkered board, each allotment reflecting the colours of the earth. But the land was also on a steep hill, and difficult to manage. Hard to gain a profit; hard to live on. 

This was the King’s offer to him, to keep him out of Sparta. A land with happy slaves and ground that was almost unworkable. The offer she told him to take.

“In which direction is the house?” Kassandra asked, turning to the two men behind her. 

“North,” Archelaos answered. “We’ll take the horses Kassandra, and join you tomorrow.”

She nodded and dismounted, passing her reins to Ariston. 

When she didn’t immediately turn from them, he put out a hand to her shoulder. “It’ll be fine, Kassandra. He’ll want to see you. And also…” He reached out and took off her cap, forcing her hair out around her shoulders. “He likes your hair long. It was one of the things he never shut up about.”

She grinned at him, then turned and ran north, towards the smoke she could see in the distance. She ran and ran and ran, forcing her legs to close the distance as her hair blew out wild behind her. He was there, in that house, and she would be in his arms as soon as she managed to run there. 

A year since she’d held him; like _really_ held him. When she’d touched him and felt the heat just beneath his skin. When she’d let him roam her body and send shivers over her. 

The dreams were different: a manifestation of her needs until she’d found that they shared them. So, really, she’d held him only a week ago, when she’d circled her legs around his and reminded him that she loved him. But that was a liminal space; the dreams were a place of little consequence and only minor fulfillment. 

The house was simple, with a stone exterior and a straw roof. A fire was lit in the outdoor kitchen and she could smell meat being cooked. The saliva that entered her mouth reminded her that she hadn’t eaten all day, and needed some food soon lest she starve. 

Other touches to the house caught her attention as she approached. There were blue curtains in the windows and a wooden porch out the front, with a single large chair in which a man could sit and look at the stars. Kassandra imagined it for a moment: imagined her own gaze into the heavens being reflected back at her. 

The door opened, and a figure emerged from it. He was dressed in a grey chiton that barely made it to his knees, and he had a bowl of oranges in his hands, ready to place onto a dining table. Kassandra slowed as she approached, watching the man from behind. 

Because this couldn’t be Brasidas. Her strong, solid man who had rounded edges in her dreams. This man was thin, with lowered shoulders and greying skin. He put the oranges down and Kassandra looked at the table for the first time, and noticed that it was set for guests. 

She stopped in her tracks, almost teetering forward. It was set for _one_ guest. She hadn’t sent word that she was coming: there’d been no time. And she hadn’t seen him in her dreams since the other night, when he’d asked her to come. 

Maybe it was set for someone else. For someone who deserved a home cooked meal made by loving hands. Maybe she was an interloper, not even an announced guest, and she was interrupting a new source of happiness. 

Then he turned, and looked right at her, and she saw his face for the first time in a year. 

It was him. He was smaller, skinnier, not as healthy, but it was him. She could see the bags under his eyes even in the low light of dusk, and his chiton needed washing desperately. She felt his eyes sweep her like a brand, searing away her doubt and solidifying her resolve. 

She stepped forward gingerly, then another step. By the third step she was running, leaping over the grass that surrounded his house and into his arms. He caught her with such strength that every question escaped her mind: they were the same hands that had so often caught her in their childhood. 

“Kassandra,” he whispered into her hair. “My Kass, you’re really here?”

She laughed as she nodded, bringing him impossibly close. “I’m here.”

“Then you were in my dreams…”

“Yes, _lagas_. And you were in mine.”

He pushed her away to stare into her eyes, searching them thoroughly for the answer to all the questions he’d ever had. She held onto his face with equal intensity, begging for time to stop so she could just hold him and love him. Just here, right now, to be his. 

She pushed herself forward and kissed his mouth, hungry and needing him. He replied in kind, devouring her with every fibre of his being. He pulled her to him just as he had in the dream and she opened her leg around him, tapping her ankles together so she couldn’t let go. He walked them into his house, deftly pushing aside the door and closing it behind him before depositing her onto his low, fur bed. The blankets tickled, and she made a mental note to soften them in a wash for him. He stood after putting her down and dragged his eyes from the top of her head, down over her leather chestplate and to her pteruges, where her sandals were tied above her calves. 

“Why are you armoured, Kass?” he murmured, still drinking her in. 

“In case we met anyone on the road. I was posing as a boy.”

He laughed heartily, filling the air with joy. The house seemed to breathe with him, and Kassandra knew that it was because this house had rarely seen the sentiment. Laughter was uncommon here. 

“You’re the most beautiful boy I’ve ever seen,” Brasidas said. He knelt at the base of the bed and brought her sandaled foot into his lap, untying the leather. “But I never really saw anyone else besides you, anyway.”

She wanted to look around his house, but found herself unable to look anywhere but his face. There was a new scar on his cheek, what would have been a flesh wound. She could feel that he was still strong, still himself. But his banishment had affected them both. 

“Do you like my farm?” he asked conversationally, moving to her other foot.

“The helots seem happy, relaxed.”

He nodded. “That’s because I pay them in real coin.”

“You can’t do that, Brasidas. It’s against Sparta’s way.”

He tilted his head as he slipped off her other sandal, then he brought her leg to his mouth and kissed along it, tickling up her thigh. 

“Watch me,” he whispered, as he moved up the bed towards her. 

She smiled. “You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m right.” He sat on the bed between her legs and brought them high onto his hips, his own legs crossed. Then he gestured for her hand and she gave it to him. It was warm and calloused when she felt it, as he lifted her into a sitting position and began working on her chest plate ties. 

“I can wash these blankets for you,” she said. “I just need some urine that’s been sitting for a while and it’ll soften them up.” 

He paused at her side for only a moment before continuing to untie the leather. “Are you giving me housekeeping advice, Kass?”

“Yes, unless you don’t want it. Also, you could use a bath, _lagas_.”

He looked at her wolfishly, his mouth wide in a grin. “Is that an offer?”

“It’s a promise.”

“So confident, even after no letters.”

Her mind wandered back to the set table outside, and the bowl of oranges. “Were you… were you expecting a guest for dinner tonight?”

“Yes,” he said casually, finally freeing the right tie. 

“Oh,” she said, turning her head away from him and biting her lip. 

He loosened the left tie enough to slip the breastplate over her head, and her hair tumbled around her white chiton once the armour was thrown to one side. 

“Do you know who I am, Kassandra?” he murmured, taking her hand again. 

“A...man?” 

He nodded. “A man with quite a number of loyal hoplites, actually: sent with me to this hellhole because they were inconvenient. Do you know what else I have?”

She shook her head. 

“A fast horse.”

She eyed him warily: this wasn’t a game she particularly wanted to play. But then it struck her as he pulled her bodily into his lap.

“You scouted for us!” she yelped.

His grin split his face in two, and his eyes shone brighter than she’d seen them since she’d arrived. “Yes, _meli_ , I scouted for you. And believe me when I say that the scout reported two men and a woman.”

She scowled slightly, annoyed that her disguise was so useless. But his smile was so overwhelming that she kissed him just to share in its glory. He trailed his hands down her arms and under her chiton, loosening her belt so it fell to the floor. She replied in kind, unclipping the top of his clothing until it bundled at his waist and his chest was laid bare.

It was unbearable, to have him before her and yet so many unsaid things between them. She tentatively reached for his ribs, touching the hair that disappeared below his belt. He sighed at the contact, and she watched as he curled his body towards her hand. 

“Can you tell me the truth,” she said as she noted how skinny he’d become. “Are you eating properly?”

“I’d need a wife for that.”

She blanched and stilled in his arms, but he continued to skim his fingertips along her skin. “Are you here to feed me, Kass?”

“Yes,” she whispered with absolutely no hesitation, the grounding of the promise permeating into the earth beneath them. “Yes,” she said again, louder, with a kiss on his cheek. “Fuck yes,” she swore, kissing his mouth with everything she had. It was in that moment that she knew. 

She’d been caught in his gravity since she was four years old and he tackled her to the ground. She’d been orbiting him, venturing closer and closer, until the brightness of his starlight and the strength of his resolve caused her to crater his surface. She was one, with him and only him. She needed him like a bird needed flight. Not to live, not to survive; but to thrive. 

He groaned against her mouth as she pushed her legs hard against him, straddling his hips. Then she began the motion that would wake him and make him belong to her. 

“Kass…” he whimpered when she could feel his need. “Kass, are you sure?”

“Yes.”

A hundred times yes. A thousand times yes.

“Kassandra, he’ll know,” Brasidas said, catching her hands and kissing each knuckle, one by one. “He’ll know because you won’t bleed.”

“I don’t care, Brasidas. I need it to be you. I want it to be you. I can’t have him own me so wholly. I want this with you.”

He closed his eyes slowly, then he kissed her on the cheek gently. She could feel his hesitation and his worry. 

“Brasidas, I promise you.”

He nodded, accepting her. His hands were strong when he pushed her over and into the furs. Releasing the ties at the top of her chiton and whipping the linen away, he knelt above her and opened his mouth wide, taking in her figure. He lingered on her hips, where the lean muscle of her legs started, and kissed the closest one. His tongue lingered, drawing circles in her sweaty skin, travel-weary skin.

“Brasidas…” she whispered, begging.

It was both too much and not enough; both a promise of what was to come and what he’d already sworn to her. His trail of kisses moved towards her centre, raising goosebumps as they went, as his hand moved up and over her chest, seeking her nipple. She gasped when he reached it, rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger, making it rise and harden. His hand moved to cup the breast, never ceasing the teasing, as his mouth moved down to where heat was shifting within her. 

She heard herself whisper his name again as his tongue first lashed her, gentle and long against the centre of her. It was undeniable and unmistakable. When he continued, the feeling of his tongue melted with the feeling of his hands on her to crash a series of waves through her writhing form. She couldn’t contain her movements, timing them with him. 

Only a shadow of this had reached her in the glade of their dreams, with his touch always disappearing as the coil within her tightened. But it was tightening now, and she felt her skin afire as Brasidas brought his other hand to her hip. To steady her? To stop her writhing? So he could control her burst of energy?

It was colourful when it came: like the burst of a supernova in an otherwise pitch black sky. There were colours she couldn’t recognise as it blew through her, but it was Brasidas specifically, who swam through her chorused moans and joined with her in stealing her breath. It was him, she was convinced. Only he could do this to her. Only he had the ability. 

He kissed her stomach when she eventually stopped curling. Her breath was not yet caught, but she didn’t want to catch it, either. His gaze pinned her, and his eyes were luminous as they placated her soul. This was where she lived. Here; with him. 

“I love you,” she whispered, drawing his head up towards her. 

“I know,” he replied, resting the side of his cheek on her chest. He was listening to her beating heart as she focused on his breathing, both of them intertwining their love in the basic movements of life. “Let me feed you, Kassandra, before you decide to go further.”

“What do you mean?” she asked. “I want you, Brasidas.”

“And I know what kind of journey it is from Sparta on an empty stomach. Let me feed you.”

She smiled, shaking her head. “You’re impossible.”

He shifted so he was eye to eye with her. “I’m right.”

He lifted himself from the bed and tightened his belt. “I forbid you from moving.”

She scrunched up her nose and thinned her mouth, refusing to be told what to do. He sighed, rolling his eyes. 

“If you move, you’ll have to dress, and I spent much too much time undressing you. If you stay here, then I can go and carve the lamb and bring you back some. I might even lose my own chiton, in that case. Satisfied?”

She grinned at him, signed _yes_ , and let him leave her to the house. 

After triple checking that all the curtains were down and secure, Kassandra ventured throughout the room to inspect it. It was sparsely furnished, with a few rugs and some cushions lining the floor. There was a chest to hold his armour and a few earthenware mugs around the room. Nothing substantial, nothing fancy. She felt the emptiness of the house, like no one lived here. 

He brought in a plate of lamb and laid it in the centre of one of the rugs, smiling as he gestured her onto a cushion. The smell of the lamb was overwhelming, especially when taken with the sparsity of the room. 

He’d butchered this lamb _for her._

He’d cooked it _for her_.

He didn’t treat himself this well. He barely ate, she knew. But a whole animal was for her. 

“Now, before you ask,” he said, sitting in front of her, “no, there are no carrots because apparently they refuse to grow here. But what there is,” he paused and opened a steaming pot, “is fried eggplant: everybody’s favourite.”

She watched as he cut the lamb into smaller pieces, his hands quick and excited. 

“Surely we can’t eat a whole lamb,” she remarked, reaching for a piece. 

“No, I gave half to the helots, too. Might be why they were so happy when you passed them today.”

She let her face melt into a smile as she watched him. He was so buoyant; _happy_. Like his hopes were pinned only to this moment and he could elongate it beyond her marriage to someone else. 

“Tell me about living here,” she said, swallowing a piece of lamb.

He shrugged. “It’s a farm that runs while I drill my men. The helots look after it mostly. I actually probably wouldn’t have been here if I hadn’t have shared the dream with you the other night, and thought you might turn up. But it’s a farm, Kass. Just a farm.”

He looked at her then, his eyes almost pleading with her. 

“I like it,” she said eventually. “I won’t have a farm, after. The… the King’s residence is in the centre of the city.”

“Yes,” he replied with a whisper. “That’s right. With the olive trees.”

She nodded. “I… I could have olives all the time, I suppose.”

“You don’t like olives.”

“No. I don’t.”

They lapsed into silence as their gaze refused to budge from each other. Each movement of Kassandra’s eyes was matched and returned in Brasidas’, like they were dancing in the lost light of the night. Untouching and refusing to breathe. 

Brasidas spoke first. “The day you told me to take the land almost broke me, Kass. Right in two. I know why you did it. I had Pausanias’ threats still fresh in my mind then, and he’d promised horror for you, too.”

Her mouth opened wide, but he put up a hand to stall her. 

“No, let me finish. It seemed to be a choice between the woman I loved being warm and safe and comfortable, or either dead in the ground or a vagrant with me. And I chose as much as you did, Kass. I chose to keep you safe. And despite how he expresses it and how it makes you feel, I think the King does hold affection for you. Enough to protect you. So, although you told me to take the land, I don’t want you to think that you ever forced me or coerced me. I don’t want that to be on you. It was my decision too.”

Her mouth still hung open, catching flies. He leant over and touched her cheek lightly, and she snapped it shut. 

“I only want you to be happy, Kass. Always. And I think if you gave it a go, you could be happy in Sparta.”

She shook her head at him, unable to believe what she was hearing. This man, this _bloody man_ , was letting her go. When she’d come here to -

To what?

She looked down at the lamb he’d so lovingly prepared for her. The perfect crust; the perfect amount of juice; the perfect level of pink. For her. 

“I don’t…” she began, before her voice failed her completely. She took another piece of lamb between her fingers and slid it down her throat, delaying her need to speak. 

“I just-.” 

“No,” she interrupted, furious. “You don’t get to talk again.”

His eyes shimmered, refracting the light. 

“You have the nerve,” she began. “The _audacity_ , to speak such things to me? To tell me how I could be happy, and with whom? That my heart could be dug up from a farm in Messenia and unceremoniously deposited into a King’s house in Sparta, just because _I’m not trying_?”

“Kass-.”

“NO!” she yelled. “You do not get to tell me that! You do not present to me in the state you are: with no muscle on your bones, with the saddest eyes I’ve ever seen, and then tell me to go and be happy! How could I be happy when you’re wasting away here, Brasidas? How!”

He stayed quiet this time, and she was glad for it.

“This is how Sparta’s greatest prospect is left to foul on the edge of a barren mountain, is it?” she yelled. 

She threw up her arms in the air, asking the Gods for strength, and he collected her wrists in his hands, bringing her down on top of him. His face was desperate when she finally saw it, if controlled. There was a slight tick to his neck that was the only indication of his matched anger. 

“Yes, Kassandra. This is how I rot without you. And yes, if I had my choice again, I would marry you with every man, woman, and child of Sparta watching. But instead, I can keep you safe and warm and loved.”

“Marry me then,” she said, holding his face within her hands. “Marry me now, and I’ll take you. I’ll love you, and I’ll take you.”

He searched her face for the lie, for the promise. Then he kissed her roughly and picked her up, depositing her on the bed again. Her hands found his belt and untied it, throwing it as far from the bed as possible. She roamed him, each scar and callous hers. Each nick and bone and depression in the skin was hers to kiss and touch and love. 

His mouth found her nipple already hard, and he stroked it with his tongue, letting his hand move between her thighs. She felt his length move against her hip and reached for it, the silk of his skin belying the hardness beneath. She paused, unsure what to do. He was duly distracting her, stroking her beyond herself, and she just casually moved her thumb over the tip of him in a mirrored motion. He shuddered slightly, pushing into her hand and causing his own skin to move back along his length. 

She followed his prompt, massaging along him until she felt a warmth come out of the end and linger on her hand. Each stroke she achieved was answered with his fingers inside her, and she found that she couldn’t do more than move. 

“Kass,” he whispered, breathing in her hair. 

“Yes?”

“I need…”

She turned her face and looked directly at him. Between them was years of trust and friendship and protection, woven into a tapestry that had colours others couldn’t comprehend. There was his red cloak, tied around her broken arm. There was the brown of the mud that she’d smeared into his face. Here was the muted golden colour of the jewellery she’d worn when he’d first kissed her. Here was the colour of his eyes in the dark, laughing. All they had been, all they were, was written between them. 

Then she reached out and dragged a piece of his curled hair behind his ear, lingering on the base of his earlobe. 

“I will give you everything, _lagas_. Everything.”

He nodded, then knelt between her legs and parted them, staring only at her eyes. She tilted her hips up to him, heels embedded in the furs that lined his bed. He paused just as she felt him at the beginning of her, and she groaned in frustration. 

“I want to marry you, Kassandra Nikida,” he muttered. 

“And you’ve stolen me from Sparta to do just that,” she confirmed, smiling at him. 

“I swear that I’m yours to keep, until my dying breath. My wealth, my home, my love is only to be shared with you. My heart and my life are in your hands, until Hades sentences me to Tartarus. I swear it, Kassandra. I swear to be your husband.”

She reached up and kissed him gently on the forehead, sealing his vow with tenderness. 

“Brasidas Tellidas, you’re the only joy in my life. I swear to stand with you, spear in hand, to defend you, us, and our children when they come. I will share my home, my love and everything I have with you, until my dying breath. I swear to be your wife.”

He returned the kiss to her hairline, pausing to breathe her in. She caught her own air just as he relinquished control of his body, and entered her slowly. She didn’t yelp, or cry out. Nor did she feel any tearing or indication of the virgin she knew she was. Instead, it was just an uncomfortable pressure that released as he pushed into her. He was slow and considerate, watching her face for the slightest sign of pain. 

He shuddered when he reached the end, putting his forehead to hers in pure, unadulterated joy. She knew that he would have bedded her many times over the past few years, if she’d let him. If he’d had the gall to claim more than just her mouth and her skin. When he pulled back, and she felt the pressure ease, she knew that this was what she wanted to give him. She needed to give him all of her, lest she be a liar and a thief. 

He repositioned himself and brought a hand between her thighs, where her heat was collecting again. And when he plunged in slowly, this time he forced her to moan as he struck along the inside of her nerves. He continued, a push and pull with her, until she grasped at his back and brought her knees wide. His speed increased, rubbing faster and faster until she was yelping his name and the names of the Gods, joined together in the triumph that was him. Unable to cope, unable to ride the swell to its end, Kassandra grappled at his hand and brought it up and away from her, starving her of his touch. He grunted at her in protest but she just kissed along his jaw and used the touch to promise that nothing was amiss; nothing was wrong. His hands became stronger then, moving to her hips and holding them in place as he moved her home. She felt a slight tear, then, like her insides unravelling, but he continued until he was erupting in goosebumps and slumped down onto her chest. 

He moved more slowly, emptying himself inside her as she hugged his back and whispered a prayer of love over him. He eventually slowed to a stop, his breath returning as he smiled and flicked her on the nose. 

“I’m your husband,” he said.

She nodded slowly. “I’m not your wife, yet.”

She moved from beneath him, ignoring the sweet smelling evidence of his enjoyment that was then pouring out of her, and reached for her grandfather’s spear. She passed it to him and held her hair in her fist. 

“Cropped to the neck”, she said, pointing to where she meant. He looked between her and the blade, honed for deadly tasks. Then he positioned it as she passed the hair to him. 

“But I love your hair,” he whispered, taking aim.

“Then feel free to keep some.”

He laughed in his joyous way as he sliced through the chestnut locks, still holding them in his fist. 

“Now are you my wife?” he asked.

She nodded. “Forever, or, at least, until I get sick of you.”

He grinned at her, then hugged her to him and brought her down to the bed, positioning her head into his shoulder. She picked up some of the itchy blankets and covered them both, closing her eyes in peace for the first time since she was thirteen. 

“My love,” he whispered, drawing designs on her shoulder.

“My light,” she replied, drifting off to sleep.

* * *

“Get up! We’ve got trouble!” 

Kassandra opened her eyes to bright sunlight streaming into the room from the front door. A rough blanket was thrown over her as the warm body next to her moved away.

“What trouble?” Brasidas asked, voice not remembering sleep. 

“Group of ten just east of here. King at the head.”

“No,” Brasidas whispered. “I thought we had more time.”

Kassandra moved the blanket from her head and glared up at the intrusion. Ariston stared down at her, his mouth wide and his eyes terrified. 

“What the fuck have you done, Brasidas?” he said, turning to him. 

Archelaos entered the room next, his eyes immediately finding Kassandra’s prone form. His eyes weren’t fearful; they were determined. 

“I married him,” Kassandra said simply, putting out her hand for someone to pass her a chiton. Archelaos obliged. 

“You what?” Ariston said in a disbelieving tone. 

“I married him.”

“But… you can’t just marry someone!” Archelaos said. “You need priests, and witnesses, and-.”

Ariston swore an oath that made even Kassandra blush. “I think we just became those witnesses, Archy,” he said. He turned to Brasidas. “This wasn’t how it was meant to be!”

“Well, I changed how things were meant to be!”

“You just couldn’t contain yourself. And you may have undone painstaking work-!”

“What do we do about the King?” Kassandra interrupted, clipping her clothing to her.

“Well you’re running, there’s no doubt in that,” Ariston said. “Your father will murder me if harm befalls you.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Oh, yes you are,” Ariston countered. “You and Archy are going to head for the hills while Brasidas and I try to explain where the fucking future queen is.”

Kassandra turned to Brasidas and saw the misery on his face. “Please, _lagas_ ,” she said. “Don’t send me away.”

“He might not even be here for that… he might still think you’re on Taygetos.”

“Brasidas...” she pleaded. He looked down at her and cupped her cheek with his hand, pressing lightly on her jaw. 

“Go with Archelaos, Kass,” he said. She knew the look in his eye because he’d used it on the mountain when they were teenagers. He was the commander now, dictating troop positions so they could best survive the field. 

“I’m not your hoplite,” she said. “I’m your wife.”

“Yes, and I’d like you to survive this, my love. Please. Go with Archelaos.”

She searched his eyes and saw only cool calculation: the eyes of a man who was trying to protect her yet again. So she nodded, and kissed the tip of his nose before taking Archelaos’ hand and running from the house. 

He saddled her grey mare with lightning speed and precision, muttering to himself the whole time.

“Never should have come here…”

“What was that?” Kassandra asked him, turning sharply. 

“I said,” he repeated, “that we never should have brought you here. It was always going to end this way.”

“Then why did you bring me here, Archy?”

He turned to her then, abandoning the leather of the bridle. “Because you were both dying, and I couldn’t stand to watch it. And because I love you both and we all want you both to be happy.”

She flinched from his words and the truth of them. “Then it was a stupid plan.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “It wasn’t your plan, so don’t take too much responsibility.”

“Not my-?.”

But he shushed her gently, listening to the wind.

“Shit,” he whispered, pushing her behind a door. “I think we might be too late.”

Kassandra listened and heard what he meant: a team of horses were travelling up the hill with fully armoured Spartan krypteia in the saddles. They were being led by Philon, his black warhorse unmistakeable even outside of Sparta. But in front of him was a boy: one Kassandra immediately recognised. 

“No, Kass,” Archelaos whispered, holding tight to her and covering her mouth. She screamed in protest while making no sound at all. “I know, I know. But it simply explains why he knew you were here. He won’t harm the boy.”

Kass shook her head, tears streaming down her face. Alexios was with the King. Alexios, who should be safe and surrounded by flowers, was instead on top of a biting stallion in the far off land of Messenia. Coming with her intended husband to claim her. She pushed against Archelaos, begging to at least be able to see her brother. When he came into view, it hardened her resolve. She thrashed, but Archelaos was stronger. 

“Brasidas Tellidas,” Philon called from his horse. “This boy here tells a strange tale. So strange, in fact, that I had to ride to Messenia for myself to see if it was true. Isn’t that right, Alexios?”

The front door of the house opened sharply and Brasidas walked out, fully armoured. It shone in the sun, the gold winking at her and teasing the distance between her and the man she loved. 

“King,” he said, bowing low to his waist. He waited for permission to rise, but the King never granted it. 

“Where is she, Brasidas?” he asked instead, dismounting his horse. 

“Where is who, King?”

“You know exactly who,” he spat. “She sent her brother on her errand so she could come here. She spat on me when she sent a boy to collect the sacred flowers for our union. He should be killed for it, in honesty, but I’m going to stay his killing until Kassandra shows her face.”

She mustered her strength and fought Archelaos with all she had: biting, kicking, punching him. But he just shushed in her ear, holding her tight. 

Brasidas rose then, and placed his eyes directly on Alexios as he sat atop the horse. Kassandra couldn’t see his expression, but she knew what would be on his face. Apology, and hope. He would be telling Alexios that everything would be okay. 

Kassandra fought harder.

“But, of course, the fact that she’s here is problematic as well, isn’t it,” Philon continued, gesturing to his men to dismount. “Tell me why she was here.”

“I think you know,” Brasidas replied. “I think you know why she came here.”

“You’ve always been a bit of an idiot, haven’t you, Brasidas? Always stuck your fingers where they didn’t belong.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” he countered. “I think my fingers were very much at home last night.”

Kassandra stilled for the first time, processing what he said. Archelaos used the moment to push a gag into her mouth and pull her wrists into a knot. 

“I’m sorry, Kass,” he said. “But Brasidas is my commander. He and Ariston can’t take those men alone.”

She screamed against the cloth at him: begging again. He gently kissed her cheek and walked out the back of the stable, taking his own horse with him. Kassandra was forced to watch, helpless and soundless, as her husband, the man she loved more than her own life, joked with her betrothed about fucking her. 

“What did you say?” Philon asked, his tone clipped. 

“I said,” Brasidas almost yelled, like the King was hard-of-hearing. “I said that I stuck my fingers in Kassandra last night.”

One of the horses behind Philon reared back as a krypteia unsheathed his blade, but Philon just put up his hand, eyeing Brasidas. 

“It’s no secret that she loves you. Everyone knows that,” he said. “But I didn’t think you’d risk her like this. I thought you loved her, too.”

“I do love her, more than you could ever know.”

“And yet, her brother dies at your hand.” Philon unsheathed his own blade as Kassandra fought against her binds, pressing her hands tighter than she ever had. The gag was solid, but the ties had a workable give. 

Archelaos tore up the hill from the west, reining his horse in next to the house.

“Another Spartan?” Philon said. “Are you breeding them, Brasidas?”

He tilted his head. “Yes. Like I told you. Last night. With my wife.”

“Your wife…” the King said, breath caught on the wind.

“Kassandra is away,” Archelaos announced, preventing Philon from speaking. “And you won’t find her.”

“Hmm,” he murmured. “Two Lieutenants and one hoplite disobeying their King in a single day. Troublesome.”

The King looked behind him and gestured to some of his men. “She couldn’t have gotten far,” he announced. Four of his men mounted their horses and disappeared in the direction that Archy had appeared from, but he just dismounted and stood behind Brasidas, weapons sheathed. 

“When I tried to bed her, do you know what she told me?” Philon continued. “She told me that she wanted her first time to be special, rather than me railing her to a post. I had waited so long for her, you see, and I figured that another few weeks were nothing. But, instead, I find her here, with you.”

He paused, turning to Alexios. “Get off the horse, boy.” Alexios whimpered as he obliged, sliding from the saddle with bound hands. Kassandra fought her bindings, feeling the blood stream down her hands. 

Alexios moved towards Brasidas, and her husband instinctively put out his hands to receive him, but Philon stopped him by the shoulder. He unsheathed his blade and positioned it behind Alexios, letting the point draw blood through his chiton. Kassandra screamed. 

“Tell me where she is, or the boy dies.”

Brasidas just watched the King, eyes murderous. If he wasn’t surrounded by primed soldiers, with Alexios in such a vulnerable position, she knew that Brasidas would already have run him through with his spear. But Archelaos glanced to the stable, where she was hidden, and it was enough. 

“Ah,” Philon said, gesturing behind him. “Go and check the stable.”

“No!” Archelaos screamed just as Kassandra’s ties slipped from her arms. She sprawled to the floor, receiving a mouthful of dirt and grazes over her arms and knees. 

She was up and running before the krypteia had even turned to the stable, and she ran straight for Alexios. His eyes went wide when he saw her, and she almost reached him until she was stopped by a blade held to her throat. 

Philon eyed her as he drew the blood of her neck, driving the kopis into the meat. She supposed that it hurt, but all she felt of it was the tickle of the blood as it slipped under her chiton. He pushed Alexios away and her eyes followed him to Brasidas’ open arms, to safety. She relaxed, even with the blade to her throat. 

“Ahh, my dove. How nice to see you.”

She stayed silent. 

“Tell me, please,” he continued. “What am I to do with you?”

Kassandra was stil, calm, now that her brother was safe. She glanced to the open door of the house and saw Alexios moved back, behind Ariston. 

“Let me go,” she whispered. “Let me be free.”

The beginning of a smirk pulled at his mouth. “No, I don’t think so. In fact, I can think of a fitting punishment for your disobedience, Kassandra. Do you remember what you told me in the forest behind your house, just before you kissed me like you wanted me?”

Her breathing evened, no longer gasping. It was the night he tried to bed her and she refused, telling him that her father would murder him for it. 

“You told me that you would come to me willingly if I spared the man you loved. And yet, here you are, your part of the bargain broken.”

Her eyes filled with tears at remembering. 

“And I told you to convince me. So, convince me.”

“With a kopis to my throat?” she snapped. 

“If this is any indication of a trend, then I imagine much of our marriage will be with a kopis to your throat. Now, convince me to let the people in this house go.”

She was… numb. She was beyond feeling; beyond grief. She couldn’t look at Brasidas or Archelaos or Ariston as they stood, their spears in hand. She couldn’t look at the house where she felt at peace just last night, curled against her largest love. 

But then she decided that it was worth the fight. It was worth her happiness.

“A King’s power is dependent on the ephors and the apella.”

He began to smirk at her, picking at her angle. 

“And my father is the Wolf of Sparta. My mother is Agiad and I am a Lieutenant. You can take none of those things from us, but if you harm a hair on my brother’s or my head, my parents will demand vengeance, and the appella will give it to them.”

His smirk only slipped a little before becoming glued into place. 

He walked towards her, his kopis painfully ripping into her neck, before his nose touched hers. 

“Tell me, dove. Did he take you?”

Kassandra closed her eyes, calming herself. But when she opened them, she was ready to spit fire. 

“Yes,” she spat. “I’m his wife.”

Philon closed his eyes slowly, dragging the kopis from her neck. Instead, he pushed the point into the skin of her stomach, begging to release it into her flesh.

“But,” she whimpered against his hand. “If you leave them alone, I will return with you.”

He opened his eyes then. “You’ve already tried that, Kass. What would stop you from coming here again?”

“You would leave my brother here. If you were to come back here, then it would risk him too.”

He pushed the kopis in, but only half an inch, where her lower stomach lay. She felt the blood stream down her front, right where Brasidas had so lovingly touched her. She heard him react behind her, but she signed for him to stop even as her mind begged him. 

“Okay, Kassandra. You will come back to Sparta. Alexios will stay here, with Brasidas, and if you come back here, if you insist on your marriage to this interloper, then your brother will die. Do you understand me?”

She nodded only once. No more times were needed. Nothing else was needed. 

“Please let me say goodbye to them,” she muttered, holding onto the wound on her stomach. “Please, Philon.”

He whisked his hand at her, dismissing her. “Of course, dove. But it will be the last time you see them.”

Kassandra stumbled over to Alexios, falling to her knees in front of him. He leapt into her arms, drawing her painfully close. 

“I’m so sorry, K. They found me and you told me not to lie if I was found and they brought me to the King and-.”

“A, please,” she gulped. “Promise me something.” He nodded, bobbing his head up and down. “Promise me that you will never blame yourself for this.”

“But K, I-.”

“No, Alexios. This is not your fault. Brasidas will remind you of it. But promise me.”

Tears ran down his face, tracking dirt. “I promise.”

“Thank you. I love you. Never forget that.”

She stood then, and faced her husband. His eyes lingered on her throat, on her stomach, on her wrists. 

“You should have run like I asked you to,” he whispered. She shook her head. 

“We ran out of time.”

“Kass?” he said, throat constricted. 

“ _Lagas_?”

He didn’t answer her with words. Perhaps he couldn’t bear it. Maybe his hands had forced the sign, called from his core and only able to be expressed through his fingers.

_I will come for you._

She shook her head, signing a single letter. 

_A._

He took in her face again, and started forward to touch her. She stepped away, shuddering, until her back was pressed into the front of the King. 

Her right hand touched her heart and pointed to both of them. 

Then the King mounted his horse and pulled her up in front of him, and the last view of them that she saw was of the rain soaking the fields as they galloped away.

* * *

“I never wanted it to come to this, Kassandra,” the King whispered into her throat as they meandered down the mountain towards their city. “I wanted you to be happy to marry me.”

“How could I ever be?” she replied. 

“You’re right. I should have killed that boy when you were thirteen and your eyes never left him.”

“Or you should have placed your eyes on a different girl.”

“Tut, tut, Kass. What did I tell you in Messenia?” He burrowed down into her neck, flicking her cropped hair towards him. 

She resisted the urge to fight him, even though every one of her nerves was on fire. They’d been riding for hours, without a break, and he’d taken the liberty of claiming each inch of skin he could find. 

“Yes, King,” she said, voice lowered. 

_Convince me._

She just wanted to sleep. If she slept, then she might see Brasidas again. 

“We’re marrying tomorrow, dove. So tonight you will spend with your mother, and tomorrow night, you will spend with me.”

She didn’t shudder. She’d heard the same line from him many times over the past day. 

“Yes, King.”

“And then you won’t be leaving my house until you’re pleased and sated and mine.”

Her breath moved into and out of her body almost unwillingly. Like she was fighting with her body to survive. This was what she’d been trained for. This was what she’d been told was her journey since she was small. Part of her hoped that she would get a choice, in the end, either through her father’s right of veto or through her own. But she’d made a choice, and it had been ignored by everyone. Nobody who looked at her and saw her shaded eyes would doubt that her heart was in Messenia. 

“Yes, King,” she muttered again, steeling her shoulders. 

He grunted at her, then drove his horse into a gallop as Sparta came into view, the temple proud and the streets golden in the afternoon light. His horse walked through the open gate of her parents’ house and her father walked out the front door, chiton on his back but spear in his hand. 

“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded, staking his spear into the ground. 

“Our future Queen took a jaunt to Messenia, Wolf. I simply fetched her back.”

Her father’s eyes widened as he took in her blood soaked clothing, landing on the wound to her neck. He left his spear behind him and walked to the horse, putting out his hands to receive her. She ignored him, instead sliding down the other side of the stallion. 

“We marry tomorrow, Nikolaos. Be sure she’s prepared.”

Nikolaos nodded without looking at him, without bowing. 

“Until tomorrow, my dove.” Philon then reined his horse around and galloped out of the yard.

“Kassandra,” her father whispered, eyes not leaving hers. “What happened?”

She gulped down her grief, her stupidity, her hubris. 

“I decided to love Brasidas, and in doing so, I lost both him and Alexios.”

Nikolaos’ eyes changed. Where before they were worried and pleading, now they were dark and the heart of a storm. 

“Alexios?”

She nodded. “Pausanias made me leave him behind in Messenia, with Brasidas. He was payment, he said. For seeking him.”

Nikolaos was never a man who sought anger. He circled it, edging in and out how he saw fit. He wasn’t political, just apathetic to things he didn’t hold dear. 

But he held his children dear. 

“Kassandra,” he began, picking his spear from the ground. “Is Brasidas or Pausanias the reason your hair is cut short?”

She looked into his dark eyes, and knew that something beneath the ground had shifted. Her father could tolerate a royal match for her; he could even appreciate that it might be a boon if it worked well. 

But he couldn’t tolerate direct harm to his children. 

“Brasidas,” she whispered, pushing a stray lock behind her ear. “I…”

“You married him?”

She nodded, slow at first, but then faster until she felt her cheeks swell in a cry. 

“That’s why the King insisted on tomorrow. Just in case.”

“I’m not allowed to belong to anyone else. If I don’t convince him, then he’ll kill my brother and my husband.”

Her father put her face in his hands, drawing along her jaw and up to her hairline. 

“Kassandra, can I tell you something?” She nodded, so he continued. “Do you know why they call me the Wolf of Sparta?”

She knew why. She knew of his ruthlessness on the field; of how cannily he directed hoplites and trained the next generation of leaders. The tertiary stream was loyal to him. The agoge was loyal to him. 

And by extension, loyal to her. 

“Kings can be lost. The Apella and the Gerousia and the Ephors hold more power than either King. And the priests of the temple, too.”

She tilted her chin up to him and let her tears fall. 

“No King’s power is absolute; Sparta doesn’t allow it, my light.” 

He pulled away from her then and tucked her hand into his elbow, directing her inside. She stumbled as she followed, her feet leaden and bare. Her father placed her on a cushion on the floor and busied himself with preparing her food. 

“Where’s mater?” she asked, face not leaving her hands. 

“Out.”

She gulped back her relief. “Preparing for tomorrow?”

“No, Kassandra.”

He passed her the plate of food and she looked at it like it would bite her. She didn’t deserve these loving hands making and serving her food. She didn’t deserve the love of the men around her. A sob erupted, and she buried it back to the place in her soul where her grief lived. Her father sat down opposite her. 

“Please tell me the truth, Kassandra.”

She turned to him sharply then. “What?”

“Please tell me what happened.”

She took a deep, steadying breath, then began to explain the previous thirty-six hours. She didn’t dwell on what happened in Brasidas’ house except for the words they’d spoken to each other and the vows they’d taken. Her father asked for clarification only once: when she described how Pausanias had taken his blade to her and wounded her neck and gut. 

“Ariston and Archelaos are still with Brasidas in Messenia?” he asked, tilting his head to the left. 

“I think so,” she replied. “I know they’re loyal to him.”

“They’re loyal to him because he’s loyal to me,” her father muttered, reaching for his armour chest. “And I expect it to stay that way.”

“Pater?”

“Yes, love?”

“I’m sorry that I lost Alexios.”

He knelt in front of her and took her blooded hands. “No, Kassandra. You didn’t lose Alexios. You were placed in an untenable position where your brother was what wrought your heart from you. The King did that, and the King will pay for it. But you should sleep now, because tomorrow is fast approaching.”

He didn’t tell her twice, but instead turned back to his chest full of armour, sifting through for something specific. 

Kassandra didn’t bother him as she ventured to her bedroom. She watched the sun go down in the west, feeling the last of the day’s heat on her face before she curled into her bed, dreading tomorrow.

* * *

“Kass?”

She refused to rise. The dream was torture. 

“My Kass?”

A whispered cry that tore out her heart. She had no right to hear him again, now, after so much was spent in forcing herself from him. 

“Tell me you’re there, Kass. Please.”

“Stop torturing me, _lagas_ ,” she muttered, eyes closed and refusing. “Messenia is too far.”

“I told you that I would come for you.” There was a shift by the windowsill as the curtain let the moonlight in. 

Then there was a loud curse as a pot was pushed aside and the soil and greenery tumbled out of it. She opened her eyes, sitting up in her bed sharply. His hand found her mouth before she could scream. 

“Hush, Kass, please.”

He let her go, but her mouth hung open. 

“I told you specifically to look after my brother!” she whispered fiercely. 

“Alexios is taken care of, I swear it. He’s in the village with the helots. You know, the ones that are deathly loyal?”

“Brasidas…”

He pushed her hair behind her ear, a boyish grin on his face as he took her in. His eyes trailed down to the brown wound on her neck, still weeping, and touched it lightly. 

“Can I be mad at you for a hot minute?” he ventured, voice soft and light. 

“Yes, I suppose you can.”

He leant in and kissed the blood, not yet cleaned from the dust of the road. “I’m furious at how you put yourself in harm’s way.”

“I know,” she whispered. 

“And I’m furious that you didn’t run.”

“I know.”

“And I don’t think my life would be worth anything without you, Kass. And he almost took you from me in my own house.”

She knew it was true, and the soft caress of his voice was a balm that spread through the grief of her insides. 

“And,” he continued, kissing her ear and tilting her chin. “I’m here to see your father.” Her eyes widened in fear at him, and he chuckled knowingly. “Don’t fret, Kass. This has been in motion for a while.”

“In motion?”

“Yes, wife. You’re mine, and mine alone.”

His mouth was gentle and had no sense of claim when she felt it. It was simply requesting a taste of her, to engulf her in his smell. She pulled him down to her more forcefully, but he refused to be led. 

“Soon, _meli_. But I have a task to do first.”

He stood from her bed and kissed her knuckles, one by one, each a declaration of his love. Then he left her room, shutting the door quietly behind him. 

She heard the murmurs of her father, and Brasidas’ subsequent greeting. She lay back onto the furs of her bed and listened closely, unable to make out the words, but hearing the sentiment all the same. 

Brasidas was here to save her. And her father was going to help him.

* * *

She woke to songbirds and muted light coming through her window. A sigh escaped before she could help it: safe and warm and loved in her small, childhood bed. She pushed into the warmth at her back, smelling the contentment and letting it spill into her heart. Turning, she kissed his bare chest and nuzzled into his hair, earning a contented rumble from him, too. 

“My love,” he whispered, drawing her closer. 

“It wasn’t a dream,” she replied, eyes closing as her cheek rested on his warm skin. 

“Not this time.”

She sighed, not acknowledging anything else. She was only here, and there was only him, and nothing else mattered. 

Until the fact that it was morning struck her cold, her bones shivering in the onslaught of dread. He must have felt it, because his arms came around her more tightly, anchoring her. 

“Brasidas…” she began. 

“No, Kass. You will not be married today. Not to him, anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

“I told you last night: this has been in motion for a while. I wasn’t the only one wasting away without you.”

She opened her mouth, though the skin around it was tight. “My father?”

He nodded gently. “Your father and his men. The Wolf owns the agoge. There is no man that escapes that place who is not loyal to him; and the King never even attended.”

“This is dangerous.”

“This is worth it, Kassandra. You’re worth your happiness.”

He kissed her gently on the forehead, lingering in the touch. “I swore I would protect you from this marriage, and that’s what I’m doing.”

“Thank you.”

It was all she could say in that moment. The promise that he’d first made when they were idiot kids on the side of the mountain, and again when they were simply idiot adults, was all that rang through her mind. He’d keep his promise. He’d protect her from this. 

“Brasidas? Kassandra?” came her father’s voice through the door. 

Brasidas rose and Kass sat on the edge of the bed, brushing her fingers through her short hair. 

“Nikolaos,” Brasidas greeted, his forearm out. Her father didn’t hesitate to take it, his eyes on his daughter. “Ariston and Archelaos have just arrived from the mountain. Simon, Diodoros, and Attikos are already at the apella.”

“Why?” Kassandra asked, rubbing water on her wounds. 

“To bear witness, Kassandra,” her father said, like it was obvious. He glanced at Brasidas, eyes troubled. 

Her husband turned to her and knelt in front of her. “We’re going to plead that the King forced you into this partnership, Kass. That it was never your choice. Simon and Attikos can attest to the fact that you were admitted to the tertiary stream to avoid the King. Diodoros and Ariston can testify that the King imposed himself on you while you trained, while you sparred. And Ariston and Archelaos are going to be the witnesses to our marriage: that it was made as per Sparta’s laws.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “But… we didn’t have the consent of Sparta.”

“Whose consent?” her father asked. “I believe I gave my consent when you left here the day before yesterday. I certainly gave my consent to Brasidas to marry you. And I, most certainly, did not consent to the King marrying you. And many spartiates watched your union with Brasidas if I understand it right.”

She used to think her father wasn’t political. 

She was wrong. 

“Where’s mater?” she asked again, swallowing. 

“She’s in the Bay, on an errand. She’ll be back tomorrow.”

Kassandra nodded, seeing the pieces laid bare before her. “How long have you been planning this?”

Both men looked at each other, a passing glance that told her enough. 

“When I first kissed you last year, and you told me to forget you. I went to your father and begged him for help.”

She sighed, throwing her head back. “And I asked you to take the land,” she grumbled, disbelieving. 

“Ahh, yes. That was particularly hard to bear.”

“I’m sorry, Brasidas.”

He just shook his head, smiling at her. “We were going to wait a bit longer and have a few more Spartiates on side, but the King forced our hand.”

“My hand,” Nikolaos clarified. “When he tried to take you in the field. I’d had enough by that point.”

Kassandra remembered the embers that had escaped her father’s eyes when he had looked upon her tears. 

“So what now?” she asked, getting to her feet. 

“Now, my love, you dress, you steel yourself, and then we present to the apella and tell them the horrors the King has inflicted upon you.”

* * *

There were many eyes on her. Bullish browns and brightened blues, coming from the minds of the men who would decide her fate. And not just the live ones, sitting in their carved mantels, but also the ancient eyes of her forbearers, come to bear witness and ensure that the Sparta that was enshrined is the Sparta that keeps. 

The chair was uncomfortable, but her shoulders leant into the hardened wood, begging for a reminder of her task. She’d not yet spoken. Soon she would, but for now, she simply held her hands still beneath the glare of judgement. 

“Brasidas Tellidas,” an ephor noted, eyeing him as he stood before her, fully armoured. “You claim that you married Kassandra Nikida?”

“Yes. I did.”

“Without a priest?”

“Do we require one to speak before the Gods?”

The ephor thinned his mouth. “What were the words you spoke?”

“I promised her that I would protect her, care for her, provide her with warmth and love and comfort until I lost the ability to breathe. All the things I’m pursuing now.”

“And her promises?” the ephor asked, reaching for a scroll from another man. 

Brasidas turned and looked at her, deferring to her assent to repeat them. She nodded, eyes wide. He didn’t break his stare. “She promised me her spear, me and our children when they come, as well as her heart and her soul. Until she enters Hades.”

“And then you took her?”

Brasidas broke from her eyes then, turning back to the room. “Yes. I bedded her like a husband beds a wife. Then I cut her hair from her scalp and fell asleep in her arms.”

Another ephor stepped forward, this one more portly, shorter. “Then the King arrived?”

“Yes. He arrived with a group of krypteia and Alexios Nikidas.”

“Where is Alexios Nikidas now, Brasidas?”

He eyed the ephor, glancing back towards the king. The word was a strike, a promise. 

“Safe.”

“Then what happened,” another ephor continued, staring down his nose at the first. 

“The King threatened Alexios’ life if Kassandra did not show herself. When she emerged to save her brother, the King manhandled her and sliced her neck and her stomach.”

The ephors and the apella turned to Kassandra, looking to the places she’d washed just before attending. She pointed gingerly to her neck, the v-shaped hole near the centre hardness of her throat, and then she stood and shifted her chiton to the side, placing the arm holes where the cut was positioned just above her public bone. She released the fabric and sat back down, eyes simply looking at Brasidas. 

“He cut my wife, then took her from my home in order to illegally claim her. She never chose him, and she never would.”

“Kassandra?” one man said, gesturing for her to stand. “Did you marry Brasidas?”

“Yes.”

“Did you marry Brasidas against your will?”

“No. I chose-.”

“Did Ariston and Archelaos steal you from Sparta and deposit you at Brasidas’ house, where he then took you without your permission?”

Kassandra eyed the ephor, his mouth sour and his eyes puckered. 

“How dare you suggest such a thing?” she thundered, her temper breached. “It was Pausanias that sought me without permission! He has attended every spar since I was thirteen! He touched me and smelt my hair when he had no grounds to touch me at all! Then, two weeks ago, he attempted to bed me _in a field_! That was why I went to Brasidas’. To escape the King!”

“Did he cut you?” a different ephor asked.

“Yes,” Kassandra yelped, exacerbated. 

“Did you-.”

“This is irrelevant,” she said, waving her hand. “My father gave no consent to Pausanias. I gave no consent to Pausanias. My father _did_ give consent to Brasidas, and so did I. I then married him, under witness of Archelaos and Ariston. Then the King showed up, claimed me, threatened my brother and cut me to shreds. And this court has the audacity to claim that my husband is anything but doing his duty to me?”

Murmured mutterings erupted from the room, each man turning to his neighbour and discussing her words. They were like a cacophony of bees, buzzing through the hive to pinpoint the attacker.

She always did think that her standard would be a bee, if she had one. 

She heard the spear strike the ground from behind her, the stone ringing with the command. 

“I am the Wolf of Sparta,” Nikolaos said. “And Pausanias has not only cut my daughter, he threatened the head of my son. He has committed a crime here today against my family, and I want justice.”

The words were spoken lightly, without the ire she knew he held in his gut. But she watched the faces of the apella and the ephors change to match that of her father. Those eyes then trained on their King, his ease leaking from him. 

“I was promised her hand by her mother,” Pausanias began. “I was told she was willing!”

“Bullshit,” Kassandra said. “You gave Brasidas land so he would leave Sparta. You knew I loved him, that’s why you threatened him so often with death.”

“You threatened a Lieutenant with death?” one of the ephors gasped, turning to the King. 

The King’s rage coloured his face. “I am your King!” 

The ephors didn’t answer, but Kassandra had had enough. She lengthened her chin and drew all of her physical power to her. 

“This is Sparta. Her laws are set. I have not broken them; Brasidas has not broken them; my father has not broken them. Only one man has, and he sits before you.”

The ephors, except for one, deferred their eyes from her and had the decency to look sheepish. 

“I see only one course of action,” the tall one said. 

“But he’s our King,” said the portly one, hands shaking. “You can’t just depose a King!”

A member of the apella laughed in a joyless way. 

Yes, they could. And they had deposed their last Agiad King, too. 

“Arrest him,” the tall ephor said, waving his hand at the King. “Put him into the temple until we decide what to do with him.” He turned to Kassandra, bowing his head. “My apologies, Kassandra. It never should have come to this.”

She nodded her head, then reached her hand out to Brasidas, who grasped it tightly. Then together, easily, they left the mutterings of the apella and the screaming of their King behind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! 
> 
> I know I usually add some fluff at the end but I'm on a tight deadline for something else, sorry!
> 
> I’m going to add a fluff chapter maybe in about two weeks so subscribe for that! xx


	3. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I promised fluff months ago but life gets in the way.  
> Enjoy!

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

“But I don’t-.”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“But what about-.”

“I’m sure, Brasidas.” Her left eyebrow rose in question, like it was dancing with the secret knowledge of his hesitancy. He furrowed his brow in response, almost burying his eyes. 

“But the land isn’t good. And you should have more than my hovel can provide.”

“I like your hovel,” she murmured, reaching out and grasping a piece of meat. She put it into her mouth and made a show of chewing it down: like it wasn’t perfectly cooked on the bone and melting in her mouth. 

He let his lips curl upwards, marvelling at her grace as the food between them disappeared into her sweet mouth. Here she was, both in front of him and unharmed at all. Her limbs were intact and languous in the evening light; her hair shone from their roots to their ends, unbothered by the dusty wind; her eyes pierced the night with their glare. He was lit from within by having her sitting but an arms length away. Easily touched. Gently stroked. 

She’d successfully distracted him from the conversation, and she knew it. When she was planning mischief her hairline shifted back with the tightening of the skin around her jaw. Like a smile that refused to yield to her mouth. She was tricking him; planning something. Or had planned something. Sometimes he wondered whether he knew her _too_ well: whether it would be better to be surprised by her sometimes. But, instead, he recognised the minute flex of her ears that told him she was concocting a plan in her mind.

Brasidas reached into the bowl they were sharing and picked out a slice of roasted carrot and brought it to his mouth, calculating gently.

“Tell me what you’re thinking,” she whispered. A song for the ages. A poem written by hands yet unseen. The dance of her tongue emulated and celebrated in the annals. That’s what her voice sounded like, he decided. It sounded like home. 

“I’m thinking that I don’t deserve you,” he replied. “I’m thinking,” he continued slowly while ignoring the question in her eyes, “that there isn’t a land on this Earth that would sate my need to provide you with absolutely everything.”

“Good thing I don’t need anything, then.” 

His laugh filled her father’s house. The corridors had barely known laughter in years. Decades. Centuries of quiet deadening the dust. His joy filtered through the soft fabric of the curtains and under the rough centre of the rugs. It rang into the bowls of the cupboard and circled the walls until the entire house breathed with the triumph of joy once again being present. 

“It’s true!” she said. “We could be vagabonds travelling Hellas for all I care. As long as I’m with you I don’t care.”

“All very noble,” Brasidas replied. 

“And I want to get out of Sparta. Away from my mother.” His eyes sharpened, and she put up her hands deferentially. “Just for a time, _Lagas_. Just until she forgives me for murdering her cousin.”

“She doesn’t blame you for that,” he said softly. “You know she doesn’t blame you for it.”

Kassandra laughed. “Oh, she made herself very clear.”

“Yes, but she hates _me_ , not you. She loves you, which is why she hates me.”

“Oh Brasidas, you’re very sweet,” she said dismissively. Her hand reached his forearm and squeezed it gently. “Thank you for trying.”

He didn’t reply and simply took her hand in his. Soothing along her knuckles. Down the plane of her palm. The way he knew she liked. Her sigh confirmed it for him. 

“Please can we go to Messenia,” she whispered, her eyes drooping. 

He didn’t like to deny her. Didn’t like to say anything that would ever cause her pain or discomfort. He also didn’t like to say anything that would ignite her temper and force her hand. And her mischief was an as-yet unanswered question. 

“Yes, Kass. Yes, we can go to Messenia.”  
He regretted the decision as soon as they crested the hill his house sat on. It was small, unworthy, and probably rotting from the wooden core. It was beneath her and it was all he could offer her. Even the curtains were tattered and old and white from the harsh sunlight. His breath left him noisily as he grasped just how this house represented him. Undeserving. If her father hadn’t taken pity on her when she was eleven and decided that she could join him in the tertiary stream, they would have grown apart. They wouldn’t have been able to recognise each other on the street. They wouldn’t have noticed each other; known each other; loved each other. 

But, instead, he was bringing her a pauper’s house on the side of a barren hill. 

“Here,” he said, passing her a water skin. “I’ll have to lift some more from the well down the hill.”

“That’s fine, I’ll house and feed the horses.”

“The helots can see to that.”

She hummed in acknowledgement, but put her hands out for the reins anyway. His jaw ticked with question, but he dismounted and passed her control of the horse. 

“Head to the house, I’ll be up shortly,” he said, eyes glazed against the sun. She just nodded and clicked the horse into a confident canter, not looking behind her as she went. He watched her grace and poise, questions mounting. 

None of their helots had come to meet him yet, and he’d sent word. Weird. 

He turned down the hill and gathered some pots for the water. At least he could do this: the springs here were crystal clear and untainted by either creature or man. It was the only part of the land that was worthy of her, and he was happy to provide the sweetness of the aquifers under the earth. It was something. It was the sum of his offering to her. Now that she was no longer in danger of an unhappy marriage and was safe, he needed to give her more. He needed to prove to her that he was worthy of her. The doubt was overtaking his brain and casting out every word they’d spoken. 

He’d promised her protection. And love. 

But he’d already failed to provide her with a worthy home. 

The pots were heavy as he lugged them up the hill and set them down half way to stretch his back before continuing. Kassandra was right in what she said. He’d lost weight and lost muscle in the year he was here alone. He was no longer the strength he had been when she was by his side in Sparta. After she had told him to be happy without her. After she had tried to protect him by sacrificing herself. 

He wanted to call her a fool more than once, but couldn’t bring himself to. She was no fool, and that was the problem. She’d seen too much and knew exactly what the King was capable of. She’d only underestimated her father, in the end. 

A whisper of a breeze spread his hair about his face as he waited for his arms to stop screaming. His focus was solely on his own dread that he would make a poor husband. That even though he loved her with all of his soul, that didn’t produce food or happiness. Life needed more than good intentions. 

A sack suddenly covered his eyes and he instinctively reached out, trying to grasp his assailant. Smelling of chaff and horse, he attempted to remove the sack when a tinkling laugh reached him. 

“Don’t take it off!” his wife giggled, just out of his reach. “It has to be a surprise.”

“Kassandra…” he said, low and tight.

“Brasidas…” she mimicked, still laughing. “Just relax, will you? You’ve been uptight since you were born.”

He grumbled again but did as she said, stilling his arms and trying not to bring too much feed into his lungs. 

There was a light tap on his cheek as he felt her breath against his bare neck. “Good Spartan,” she whispered.”Now turn around and walk up the hill to our home.”

“But the water,” he said as a gentle nudge pushed him north.

“The helots already collected some.”

“The helots…?”

“Hush. Now go.”

He did as she said, stumbling only once on some loose rocks on the infertile ground. He’d have to til them away eventually. A job for another day. Her hand held his the entire way, guiding him past shrubs and trees until he felt the ground flatten beneath him and the softness of grass touch his sandaled feet. 

“Kassandra…” he said in question, knowing this at least was new. 

“Shhh, just a little bit farther.”

She shook her hand from his and he felt her presence in front of him, her warmth again clouding his judgement. She was still here, despite the poverty that would now follow them. She was with him, even though he would never amount to much because he’d taken down a King. She was standing there, between him and his worst loneliness, and he could hear the undeniable smile in her voice as she asked him to close his eyes. 

How he deserved this life, this wife, this homecoming, he’d never understand. But he knew, stars aligned, that she was truly the only thing standing between him and oblivion. 

So he closed his eyes, and she removed the chaff sack covering his head. He shook off the grass and the itch it left as she positioned him under one of the trees in his front yard. 

“Now, before you open your eyes, I want you to remember that we’re already married, which you can’t take back now,” she said. “And, I want you to remember that part of the problem Pausanias had with you was the loyalty you commanded from not just your soldiers, but your helots as well.” He felt a smile start on his mouth, and she continued as if encouraged. “And, we had about a month in Sparta, with Archelaos going between here and Sparta every few days to relay your orders to your men. And-.”

“Kassandra?” he quietly interrupted. 

“Okay, okay,” she said. She took his hand and gently stroked the callouses inside his fingers. “Open your eyes.”

He did, the sun behind them and shining its orange glow onto the house. 

A stranger’s house, because this wasn’t the hovel he’d left behind. This wasn’t the mud brick mass that stood watch atop a barren hill with its sun bleached curtains and its splinter-prone dining furniture and its unpatched roof and its-

“Please say something,” she whispered, almost to herself. He couldn’t help it. He laughed. 

The roof was a stunning royal blue: almost the colour of the darkening sky. The windows had painted shutters to keep out the wind. The door was new, solid, and probably unable to be beaten in by any man. The outdoor kitchen was full of new pots and knives and bowls befitting a royal house. The dining table had eight chairs around it, all smooth and expertly carved in a cedar wood. Atop the dining table was a bowl of fruit, glistening. His eyes began to travel wider as his laughter continued. Grass was under foot and there were herbs already growing beneath the low eastern wall: rosemary, thyme, basil. Braziers burned throughout the garden, inviting and creating an atmosphere that begged for guests. 

Kassandra still had his hand, and tugged him inside behind her. “I wanted to make it a home, Brasidas. Our home. Together.”

He still couldn’t form words. She pushed the front door open and he followed her in, eyes adjusting. 

Braziers lined the walls, their bronze sconces blazing light around the room. The curtains were the same colour as the roof, with gold embroidery at the bottom in a design that resembled sunflowers. Cushions lined the floor with benches dotted along the western wall, the windows framed around them so they could watch the sunset over the fields. His pad of furs was gone and in its place was a large, carved bed with a down mattress on top, covered in handwoven blankets and pillows that made him want to sink inside them. He walked to these first, fingering the edges. 

“These are yours,” he whispered, touching the chevron design. 

“One of the perks of a wife is personally loomed cloth,” she replied. 

“A wife,” he said softly, strong. “You’re my _wife_.”

She looked at him like he’d gone mad, and he saw the mild disappointment in her eyes. Like this wasn’t his every hope and dream. 

“I…” she started. “I sent the blankets to your helots with Archy. With the money for the house repairs and instructions. I don’t want you to think of this as your hovel, Brasidas, but our home.”

He reached out with both of his hands and cupped along her jaw, almost feeling her skin for the first time. She was luminous. She was glorious. She was everything he’d ever dreamed of. 

“What in Hades did I ever do to deserve you,” he whispered before kissing her nose gently. 

“Ahh, do you want a list?” she replied, smiling. “You like it then?”

He kissed her again, gently with a feather touch. “I love it.”

“Oh thank Hera, because you didn’t say anything and then you had this slack look on your face like you do when you’re reining in your temper and I wasn’t sure-.”

He pulled her forward and crushed her against his chest. All he could do was stroke her hair and feel her in his arms. 

“You made this a home, Kass. Our home.”

“Our home,” she confirmed. 

“I love you,” he replied. “I will spend my life ensuring you know it.”

She pulled back and pushed some of his hair behind his ear. “You already have, _Lagas_.”

**Author's Note:**

> Like my work? Donate to the NSW/ACT Aboriginal Legal Service!  
> https://www.alsnswact.org.au/donate


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